WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:08.410 align:middle line:90% 00:00:08.410 --> 00:00:12.100 align:middle line:84% I had the pleasure of meeting Diane Glancy when she was here 00:00:12.100 --> 00:00:17.650 align:middle line:84% last year, on a two-month visit doing some writing and research. 00:00:17.650 --> 00:00:20.920 align:middle line:84% And it was wonderful to have her be a part of our community 00:00:20.920 --> 00:00:23.180 align:middle line:84% and to get to know her work better, 00:00:23.180 --> 00:00:26.680 align:middle line:84% so we're very happy that we could invite her back this year. 00:00:26.680 --> 00:00:31.030 align:middle line:84% She was born in Kansas City of German, English, and Cherokee 00:00:31.030 --> 00:00:33.940 align:middle line:84% parents, received a BA from the University 00:00:33.940 --> 00:00:38.170 align:middle line:84% of Missouri, an MA from Central State U in Oklahoma, 00:00:38.170 --> 00:00:42.610 align:middle line:84% and an MFA from the University of Iowa. 00:00:42.610 --> 00:00:45.580 align:middle line:84% Her books of poetry include One Age 00:00:45.580 --> 00:00:51.100 align:middle line:84% in a Dream, Offering, Brown Wolf Leaves the Res, 00:00:51.100 --> 00:00:54.610 align:middle line:84% Iron Woman, which won the Capricorn prize, 00:00:54.610 --> 00:00:58.810 align:middle line:84% and my favorite, Lone Dog's Winter Count, 00:00:58.810 --> 00:01:02.110 align:middle line:84% a really stunning series of poems that works off 00:01:02.110 --> 00:01:08.560 align:middle line:84% a spiral calendar of pictographs written on a buffalo hide. 00:01:08.560 --> 00:01:12.550 align:middle line:84% Several books of stories or mixed-genre books-- 00:01:12.550 --> 00:01:16.480 align:middle line:84% Firesticks, Trigger Dance, which won the NYLON Fiction 00:01:16.480 --> 00:01:18.640 align:middle line:84% Award from the University of Colorado. 00:01:18.640 --> 00:01:21.670 align:middle line:84% A wonderful memoir called Claiming 00:01:21.670 --> 00:01:25.570 align:middle line:84% Breath, which won the Before Columbus Book Award. 00:01:25.570 --> 00:01:30.430 align:middle line:84% And as well, plays which have been published in War Cries, 00:01:30.430 --> 00:01:33.640 align:middle line:84% and for which she's been awarded playwriting awards 00:01:33.640 --> 00:01:35.830 align:middle line:84% from Tucson's Borderlands Theater 00:01:35.830 --> 00:01:39.460 align:middle line:84% as well as from the Five Civilized Tribes. 00:01:39.460 --> 00:01:44.050 align:middle line:90% And she has a novel forthcoming. 00:01:44.050 --> 00:01:46.505 align:middle line:84% Obviously, one of the most stunning things about her work 00:01:46.505 --> 00:01:48.130 align:middle line:84% is the breadth of it, and her eagerness 00:01:48.130 --> 00:01:50.830 align:middle line:84% to try as many genres as possible 00:01:50.830 --> 00:01:56.080 align:middle line:84% and to mix up her sense of what these genres might become. 00:01:56.080 --> 00:02:00.010 align:middle line:84% Of Claiming Breath, Adrienne Rich says that "Glancy has 00:02:00.010 --> 00:02:03.400 align:middle line:84% written one of the new source books brought forth in this 00:02:03.400 --> 00:02:08.259 align:middle line:84% country today by poets for whose parents and grandparents 00:02:08.259 --> 00:02:12.170 align:middle line:84% literacy or English was not a given." 00:02:12.170 --> 00:02:16.330 align:middle line:84% And as Glancy says, "we get down to our bones in art. 00:02:16.330 --> 00:02:19.790 align:middle line:84% We find there the bones of others." 00:02:19.790 --> 00:02:22.900 align:middle line:84% And in that, she helps to establish common ground among us 00:02:22.900 --> 00:02:23.410 align:middle line:90% all. 00:02:23.410 --> 00:02:25.450 align:middle line:90% Please welcome Diane Glancy. 00:02:25.450 --> 00:02:28.761 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:02:28.761 --> 00:02:33.020 align:middle line:90% 00:02:33.020 --> 00:02:34.820 align:middle line:90% Thank you, Alison. 00:02:34.820 --> 00:02:36.420 align:middle line:90% I'm very glad to be here. 00:02:36.420 --> 00:02:37.595 align:middle line:90% Thank you all for coming. 00:02:37.595 --> 00:02:40.510 align:middle line:90% 00:02:40.510 --> 00:02:43.450 align:middle line:90% "Coyote's Shyness." 00:02:43.450 --> 00:02:48.310 align:middle line:84% "Coyote, the Native American trickster, used to be shy. 00:02:48.310 --> 00:02:51.670 align:middle line:84% He who was always shouting at everything in sight. 00:02:51.670 --> 00:02:55.390 align:middle line:84% A long time ago, Coyote talked quietly. 00:02:55.390 --> 00:02:58.090 align:middle line:90% You could say he was even shy. 00:02:58.090 --> 00:03:01.480 align:middle line:84% The grandfathers were proud of him, because, you see, 00:03:01.480 --> 00:03:04.450 align:middle line:84% when you tell a story, the little words you speak 00:03:04.450 --> 00:03:06.530 align:middle line:90% migrate to the ear. 00:03:06.530 --> 00:03:10.150 align:middle line:84% And when Coyote first spoke, he spoke this way, 00:03:10.150 --> 00:03:14.080 align:middle line:84% and his words ran like small animals covered with fur 00:03:14.080 --> 00:03:16.480 align:middle line:84% and crawled into the cave of the ear, 00:03:16.480 --> 00:03:19.210 align:middle line:84% where the words hibernate for a while, 00:03:19.210 --> 00:03:23.560 align:middle line:84% then begin to turn and scratch and come slowly awake 00:03:23.560 --> 00:03:25.400 align:middle line:90% and tell their story. 00:03:25.400 --> 00:03:27.670 align:middle line:90% That's how stories get started. 00:03:27.670 --> 00:03:31.550 align:middle line:84% Hardly before you know it, one gets into your head. 00:03:31.550 --> 00:03:35.240 align:middle line:84% And after a while, you hear it, and you begin to know who you 00:03:35.240 --> 00:03:35.740 align:middle line:90% are." 00:03:35.740 --> 00:03:40.030 align:middle line:90% 00:03:40.030 --> 00:03:42.400 align:middle line:84% Storytelling has always been very important for me. 00:03:42.400 --> 00:03:44.620 align:middle line:90% I had a hunger for words. 00:03:44.620 --> 00:03:48.220 align:middle line:84% But how do you begin putting your stories together? 00:03:48.220 --> 00:03:51.570 align:middle line:90% 00:03:51.570 --> 00:03:55.530 align:middle line:84% This next piece is dedicated to Connie Hart, who 00:03:55.530 --> 00:03:57.570 align:middle line:84% was a Koorie woman in New Zealand, 00:03:57.570 --> 00:03:59.730 align:middle line:84% and she learned basket-making by herself 00:03:59.730 --> 00:04:02.940 align:middle line:84% because her mother had not been allowed to teach her 00:04:02.940 --> 00:04:05.910 align:middle line:84% in the mission, and her baskets are now 00:04:05.910 --> 00:04:07.770 align:middle line:84% in the National Gallery in Victoria. 00:04:07.770 --> 00:04:10.440 align:middle line:84% I saw them last year when I was in Australia, 00:04:10.440 --> 00:04:15.300 align:middle line:84% and there was pictures of her starting to weave her baskets. 00:04:15.300 --> 00:04:18.149 align:middle line:84% And in the beginning, the grasses would fall apart 00:04:18.149 --> 00:04:21.810 align:middle line:84% and she would cut her fingers, and yet she kept on and on. 00:04:21.810 --> 00:04:24.240 align:middle line:84% And I thought, if she can do that with baskets, I 00:04:24.240 --> 00:04:25.275 align:middle line:90% can do that with words. 00:04:25.275 --> 00:04:27.840 align:middle line:90% 00:04:27.840 --> 00:04:31.530 align:middle line:84% "A woman makes a story because there is no shade, 00:04:31.530 --> 00:04:34.740 align:middle line:84% and you know how a story branches. 00:04:34.740 --> 00:04:37.500 align:middle line:90% A story is a tree unfolding. 00:04:37.500 --> 00:04:40.200 align:middle line:90% The leaves hide the beating sun. 00:04:40.200 --> 00:04:45.060 align:middle line:84% A story comes just like a tree, where it stands after winter. 00:04:45.060 --> 00:04:49.140 align:middle line:84% The woman says, the tree feels the sun through its bark. 00:04:49.140 --> 00:04:52.770 align:middle line:84% It feels the leaves pick-axing their way out. 00:04:52.770 --> 00:04:59.370 align:middle line:84% The trees move all summer on those little plots called stems. 00:04:59.370 --> 00:05:02.310 align:middle line:84% You know some afternoons, a story full of leaves 00:05:02.310 --> 00:05:04.260 align:middle line:90% folds up and lifts? 00:05:04.260 --> 00:05:06.300 align:middle line:84% But there has to be leaves falling 00:05:06.300 --> 00:05:09.270 align:middle line:84% after the budding all summer, after the shade 00:05:09.270 --> 00:05:13.170 align:middle line:84% to stand between, then rakes gather meaning, 00:05:13.170 --> 00:05:17.850 align:middle line:84% not from a tree out of leaves, but from moving to story again. 00:05:17.850 --> 00:05:20.370 align:middle line:84% The woman says, when it's cold, the bark 00:05:20.370 --> 00:05:23.640 align:middle line:84% looks like a column of hard, dark flames. 00:05:23.640 --> 00:05:26.910 align:middle line:84% In winter, you can hold your hand to a tree. 00:05:26.910 --> 00:05:33.200 align:middle line:90% 00:05:33.200 --> 00:05:35.840 align:middle line:84% I think of story as a living being-- 00:05:35.840 --> 00:05:40.730 align:middle line:84% not an abstract accumulation of words and voice, but a tribe. 00:05:40.730 --> 00:05:42.770 align:middle line:84% Each part of the story is a member 00:05:42.770 --> 00:05:46.220 align:middle line:84% of the family who wants to go where the others go. 00:05:46.220 --> 00:05:49.280 align:middle line:84% The last time I told the story of how we got light, 00:05:49.280 --> 00:05:51.500 align:middle line:90% I forgot the last part. 00:05:51.500 --> 00:05:54.200 align:middle line:84% It knocked in my head until I had to let it out 00:05:54.200 --> 00:05:56.570 align:middle line:84% to join the other parts of the story, which 00:05:56.570 --> 00:05:58.670 align:middle line:90% had migrated to others-- 00:05:58.670 --> 00:06:01.400 align:middle line:84% how the Earth was once in darkness, 00:06:01.400 --> 00:06:03.710 align:middle line:84% how the buzzard would go get a piece of the sun 00:06:03.710 --> 00:06:06.680 align:middle line:84% the animals remembered in the other world. 00:06:06.680 --> 00:06:09.590 align:middle line:84% But he carried the piece of sun on the top of his head, 00:06:09.590 --> 00:06:11.390 align:middle line:90% and it burned off the feathers. 00:06:11.390 --> 00:06:14.300 align:middle line:84% That's why the buzzard is bald, you know. 00:06:14.300 --> 00:06:17.090 align:middle line:84% Then the possum burned the fur off her tail trying 00:06:17.090 --> 00:06:18.800 align:middle line:90% to get a piece of the sun. 00:06:18.800 --> 00:06:21.800 align:middle line:84% And finally, the spider traveled to the other world 00:06:21.800 --> 00:06:25.760 align:middle line:84% and wrapped a piece in her web, and brought it to our sky. 00:06:25.760 --> 00:06:27.530 align:middle line:90% Now, the part I forgot. 00:06:27.530 --> 00:06:31.820 align:middle line:84% That's why the spider's web radiates outward like the sun. 00:06:31.820 --> 00:06:35.090 align:middle line:84% So now the story has made camp in your heads. 00:06:35.090 --> 00:06:38.330 align:middle line:84% The story will hunt, and at night, its campfire 00:06:38.330 --> 00:06:40.190 align:middle line:90% will keep you alive. 00:06:40.190 --> 00:06:44.210 align:middle line:84% It will tell you how not to overlook the light in sometimes 00:06:44.210 --> 00:06:46.190 align:middle line:90% unlikely things. 00:06:46.190 --> 00:06:48.590 align:middle line:90% A story speaks to the silence. 00:06:48.590 --> 00:06:50.600 align:middle line:90% You will feel it moving. 00:06:50.600 --> 00:06:54.575 align:middle line:84% A story will take you all your life to put bodies to." 00:06:54.575 --> 00:06:57.648 align:middle line:90% 00:06:57.648 --> 00:06:59.940 align:middle line:84% That actually happened in my Native American literature 00:06:59.940 --> 00:07:00.440 align:middle line:90% class. 00:07:00.440 --> 00:07:02.040 align:middle line:84% I always open class with a story, 00:07:02.040 --> 00:07:03.480 align:middle line:90% and I did forget that last part. 00:07:03.480 --> 00:07:06.300 align:middle line:84% And it was on a Friday afternoon, and all weekend, 00:07:06.300 --> 00:07:09.405 align:middle line:84% that the rest of that story was in my head, knocking to get out. 00:07:09.405 --> 00:07:15.220 align:middle line:90% 00:07:15.220 --> 00:07:18.250 align:middle line:84% Last week was library week in Minnesota. 00:07:18.250 --> 00:07:20.200 align:middle line:84% In fact, I think it was National Library Week, 00:07:20.200 --> 00:07:22.480 align:middle line:90% so maybe it was here, too. 00:07:22.480 --> 00:07:24.880 align:middle line:84% And a couple of years ago, Macalester College 00:07:24.880 --> 00:07:27.700 align:middle line:84% asked me to write a poem about the library, which I thought 00:07:27.700 --> 00:07:31.570 align:middle line:84% it was very strange, because my Cherokee grandmother was 00:07:31.570 --> 00:07:33.550 align:middle line:84% illiterate, and books were something 00:07:33.550 --> 00:07:38.180 align:middle line:84% that we didn't have very many of. 00:07:38.180 --> 00:07:41.270 align:middle line:84% So I walked over to the library and just stood awhile, 00:07:41.270 --> 00:07:42.950 align:middle line:90% and soon the words came. 00:07:42.950 --> 00:07:47.250 align:middle line:84% This is called "Grandmother Library." 00:07:47.250 --> 00:07:50.370 align:middle line:84% "The books stand like ancestors on the shelves. 00:07:50.370 --> 00:07:52.650 align:middle line:90% They sing our hunting songs. 00:07:52.650 --> 00:07:56.310 align:middle line:84% Thank them, like the animals, for their lives. 00:07:56.310 --> 00:07:58.680 align:middle line:84% Float into the white clouds of books. 00:07:58.680 --> 00:08:01.380 align:middle line:84% Surely, they are goodness within. 00:08:01.380 --> 00:08:02.880 align:middle line:90% Thumb through the pages. 00:08:02.880 --> 00:08:05.730 align:middle line:90% You'll feel the draft of wings. 00:08:05.730 --> 00:08:08.430 align:middle line:84% Look at the books as the giver of allowances, 00:08:08.430 --> 00:08:10.770 align:middle line:84% and you are holding out your hand. 00:08:10.770 --> 00:08:12.600 align:middle line:90% Act like you know them all. 00:08:12.600 --> 00:08:15.750 align:middle line:84% Gather their prairie grass into your arms. 00:08:15.750 --> 00:08:17.460 align:middle line:90% Stomp dance in the library. 00:08:17.460 --> 00:08:18.690 align:middle line:90% Powwow. 00:08:18.690 --> 00:08:20.580 align:middle line:84% Tell the books they are brothers. 00:08:20.580 --> 00:08:23.340 align:middle line:90% Say to them, you are relatives. 00:08:23.340 --> 00:08:26.280 align:middle line:84% Honor them with corn pollen on their noses. 00:08:26.280 --> 00:08:29.520 align:middle line:84% Honor them with a star quilt giveaway. 00:08:29.520 --> 00:08:31.470 align:middle line:84% Tell them they are good medicine, 00:08:31.470 --> 00:08:34.289 align:middle line:90% a buffalo herd snorting softly. 00:08:34.289 --> 00:08:39.210 align:middle line:84% Say to the books, the war ax of your pages cut. 00:08:39.210 --> 00:08:43.530 align:middle line:84% You are rows of women making a tremolo for the warriors. 00:08:43.530 --> 00:08:46.890 align:middle line:84% I see the books as rows of horses carrying the warriors 00:08:46.890 --> 00:08:48.000 align:middle line:90% into battle. 00:08:48.000 --> 00:08:51.720 align:middle line:90% I hear the war cries of books. 00:08:51.720 --> 00:08:53.790 align:middle line:84% Tell the books they are spirit dancers. 00:08:53.790 --> 00:08:56.490 align:middle line:84% Their pages are white flocks of birds. 00:08:56.490 --> 00:09:01.560 align:middle line:84% Say you hate big books, you boogie where there is no band. 00:09:01.560 --> 00:09:05.130 align:middle line:84% Say they are a table set for a company full of white plates, 00:09:05.130 --> 00:09:09.180 align:middle line:84% an after-dinner cigar or the smoke of the peace pipe, 00:09:09.180 --> 00:09:11.220 align:middle line:84% a spider carrying pieces of the sun 00:09:11.220 --> 00:09:13.770 align:middle line:90% and her web to bring us light. 00:09:13.770 --> 00:09:16.650 align:middle line:84% Say to the books, your pages are snow angels 00:09:16.650 --> 00:09:20.610 align:middle line:84% in winter, a bush full of white blossoms in summer. 00:09:20.610 --> 00:09:24.810 align:middle line:84% Look at the library like a forest or an elk herd grazing. 00:09:24.810 --> 00:09:28.200 align:middle line:84% Think of it as an intercessor saying, have mercy. 00:09:28.200 --> 00:09:30.990 align:middle line:84% Look at the work the people have done. 00:09:30.990 --> 00:09:34.290 align:middle line:84% Tell the library it is a grandmother telling stories. 00:09:34.290 --> 00:09:36.780 align:middle line:84% Without her words, we do not live." 00:09:36.780 --> 00:09:46.710 align:middle line:90% 00:09:46.710 --> 00:09:50.490 align:middle line:84% Besides stories, I think my car has been 00:09:50.490 --> 00:09:53.670 align:middle line:90% very important in my life also. 00:09:53.670 --> 00:09:58.680 align:middle line:84% And this is to honor the car, and it's called "War Horse I." 00:09:58.680 --> 00:10:01.570 align:middle line:90% 00:10:01.570 --> 00:10:04.600 align:middle line:84% "I have a new car now, but for 13 years, 00:10:04.600 --> 00:10:06.940 align:middle line:84% I drove a brown Buick station wagon. 00:10:06.940 --> 00:10:12.850 align:middle line:84% It had 184,555 miles when I gave it to a friend. 00:10:12.850 --> 00:10:15.160 align:middle line:84% You know, I think I left my husband easier 00:10:15.160 --> 00:10:17.080 align:middle line:90% than I left that car. 00:10:17.080 --> 00:10:20.320 align:middle line:84% Toward the end, I cried when I had to look for another car, 00:10:20.320 --> 00:10:24.490 align:middle line:84% but it wouldn't pass emissions test in Minnesota. 00:10:24.490 --> 00:10:26.440 align:middle line:84% I asked an Indian friend what he was going 00:10:26.440 --> 00:10:28.150 align:middle line:90% to do with his Indian car. 00:10:28.150 --> 00:10:30.940 align:middle line:84% He said there wasn't a test on the reservation, 00:10:30.940 --> 00:10:32.870 align:middle line:90% and he could keep his car. 00:10:32.870 --> 00:10:35.710 align:middle line:84% He asked what I was going to do with the Buick. 00:10:35.710 --> 00:10:38.020 align:middle line:90% He could use it for hunting. 00:10:38.020 --> 00:10:41.650 align:middle line:84% As soon as I had a place for it, I could think of another car. 00:10:41.650 --> 00:10:44.080 align:middle line:84% The first key I had for it bent from turning 00:10:44.080 --> 00:10:46.450 align:middle line:90% the ignition all those years. 00:10:46.450 --> 00:10:49.670 align:middle line:84% They almost never got a new key made. 00:10:49.670 --> 00:10:54.040 align:middle line:84% I remember when I saw the car in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1978, 00:10:54.040 --> 00:10:56.600 align:middle line:90% I knew it was mine. 00:10:56.600 --> 00:10:58.300 align:middle line:84% I don't live in Oklahoma anymore, 00:10:58.300 --> 00:11:00.910 align:middle line:84% but I remember it on the back roads there, 00:11:00.910 --> 00:11:03.820 align:middle line:84% driving Highway 62 to Altus, Oklahoma 00:11:03.820 --> 00:11:06.070 align:middle line:90% when it must have been 105-- 00:11:06.070 --> 00:11:09.340 align:middle line:84% no air-- sitting on Mount Scott near Lawton, 00:11:09.340 --> 00:11:12.610 align:middle line:84% driving to the black mesa that reaches New Mexico. 00:11:12.610 --> 00:11:14.710 align:middle line:90% My children grew up in that car. 00:11:14.710 --> 00:11:18.850 align:middle line:84% Everyone said it would never start in Minnesota when I moved, 00:11:18.850 --> 00:11:19.900 align:middle line:90% but it did. 00:11:19.900 --> 00:11:23.170 align:middle line:84% I got a small truck battery, and we went through the snow. 00:11:23.170 --> 00:11:24.820 align:middle line:84% I cleaned out the glove compartment 00:11:24.820 --> 00:11:28.120 align:middle line:84% when the car went to the Fond Du Lac reservation without me. 00:11:28.120 --> 00:11:30.370 align:middle line:84% Insurance papers with eight addresses 00:11:30.370 --> 00:11:32.020 align:middle line:90% in three different states. 00:11:32.020 --> 00:11:35.140 align:middle line:84% A few invoices for new brakes, a transmission, 00:11:35.140 --> 00:11:38.410 align:middle line:84% tires, a whisk broom, an air gauge, 00:11:38.410 --> 00:11:41.410 align:middle line:84% a bulb for the rear light, a few maps. 00:11:41.410 --> 00:11:44.110 align:middle line:84% A Bible with curled pages under the front seat. 00:11:44.110 --> 00:11:46.750 align:middle line:84% Nothing in the trunk but two ice scrapers, 00:11:46.750 --> 00:11:49.720 align:middle line:84% and some rope I used to tie things on top of the car 00:11:49.720 --> 00:11:51.220 align:middle line:90% once in a while. 00:11:51.220 --> 00:11:58.630 align:middle line:84% A 1978 Buick Estate wagon, serial number 4R35X8X153975, 00:11:58.630 --> 00:12:00.055 align:middle line:90% brown as a war horse." 00:12:00.055 --> 00:12:02.665 align:middle line:90% 00:12:02.665 --> 00:12:06.240 align:middle line:90% "War Horse II." 00:12:06.240 --> 00:12:08.850 align:middle line:84% "The next time I see my old car, it's in the movies. 00:12:08.850 --> 00:12:10.380 align:middle line:90% Yes, you wouldn't believe it. 00:12:10.380 --> 00:12:13.110 align:middle line:84% But there's this film, this documentary, 00:12:13.110 --> 00:12:16.020 align:middle line:84% Without Reservation, and my old car 00:12:16.020 --> 00:12:19.560 align:middle line:84% is in it, showing up like a big shot next to the moose 00:12:19.560 --> 00:12:21.660 align:middle line:84% hanging on the scaffolding after hunting 00:12:21.660 --> 00:12:25.830 align:middle line:84% season, the Indian friend who has my car now starting 00:12:25.830 --> 00:12:28.590 align:middle line:84% to dress the moose, and the car there as 00:12:28.590 --> 00:12:32.580 align:middle line:84% if it had part in the hunt, as if maybe it held the bow 00:12:32.580 --> 00:12:35.580 align:middle line:84% and arrow, just like when you go to the hunting grounds, 00:12:35.580 --> 00:12:38.070 align:middle line:84% you are new again, and the old way of life 00:12:38.070 --> 00:12:41.940 align:middle line:84% returns as if you'd never had to do without it. 00:12:41.940 --> 00:12:45.210 align:middle line:84% Yes, I know someday I'll see that car again on the highway, 00:12:45.210 --> 00:12:47.520 align:middle line:90% will pass as if old friends. 00:12:47.520 --> 00:12:51.270 align:middle line:84% Did not our heart beat within us, the disciples asked, 00:12:51.270 --> 00:12:54.960 align:middle line:84% when Christ passed them on the road after Resurrection? 00:12:54.960 --> 00:12:57.630 align:middle line:84% They were just going somewhere talking with their friends, 00:12:57.630 --> 00:12:58.950 align:middle line:90% and he just passed. 00:12:58.950 --> 00:13:01.170 align:middle line:84% Yes, sometime I'll be going somewhere, 00:13:01.170 --> 00:13:04.830 align:middle line:84% and my old car will come up from behind and pass me the way I 00:13:04.830 --> 00:13:07.950 align:middle line:84% know sometimes my father has been beside me, 00:13:07.950 --> 00:13:10.860 align:middle line:84% only I didn't know it until the moment he left." 00:13:10.860 --> 00:13:21.798 align:middle line:90% 00:13:21.798 --> 00:13:23.590 align:middle line:84% I have a piece here I've never read before, 00:13:23.590 --> 00:13:29.180 align:middle line:84% but I think I'm going to read one that I have first. 00:13:29.180 --> 00:13:33.540 align:middle line:84% I always feel more comfortable with a piece. 00:13:33.540 --> 00:13:35.730 align:middle line:84% I was at a writer's conference several years ago, 00:13:35.730 --> 00:13:38.310 align:middle line:84% and I heard that Comanche, who was 00:13:38.310 --> 00:13:41.640 align:middle line:84% the only survivor of the Little Bighorn, had been preserved. 00:13:41.640 --> 00:13:46.110 align:middle line:84% And not only that, but he was at Lawrence, Kansas in a museum, 00:13:46.110 --> 00:13:49.050 align:middle line:84% and my daughter happened to be in school in Lawrence 00:13:49.050 --> 00:13:50.170 align:middle line:90% at the time. 00:13:50.170 --> 00:13:54.360 align:middle line:84% And so the next time I visited her, I stopped at the museum, 00:13:54.360 --> 00:13:56.950 align:middle line:90% and indeed, Comanche is there. 00:13:56.950 --> 00:14:01.650 align:middle line:84% So if you're ever in Lawrence, Kansas, stop by and see him. 00:14:01.650 --> 00:14:05.820 align:middle line:84% "Comanche, Museum of Natural History, University of Kansas, 00:14:05.820 --> 00:14:06.690 align:middle line:90% Lawrence." 00:14:06.690 --> 00:14:09.370 align:middle line:90% 00:14:09.370 --> 00:14:10.750 align:middle line:90% "It was after a hard day. 00:14:10.750 --> 00:14:14.020 align:middle line:84% We followed rain on the Kansas turnpike. 00:14:14.020 --> 00:14:15.760 align:middle line:90% We have it often out here. 00:14:15.760 --> 00:14:19.120 align:middle line:84% Pecking the windshield louder, then softer, 00:14:19.120 --> 00:14:22.570 align:middle line:84% with a brief respite under the underpass, as if the wind 00:14:22.570 --> 00:14:25.870 align:middle line:84% suddenly stopped to take a breath. 00:14:25.870 --> 00:14:28.840 align:middle line:84% And the clouds raised their white flags in the sky, 00:14:28.840 --> 00:14:32.080 align:middle line:84% and I thought of the horse I had seen in the museum in Lawrence 00:14:32.080 --> 00:14:34.870 align:middle line:84% after visiting my daughter, and now my friend 00:14:34.870 --> 00:14:37.330 align:middle line:84% and I were returning to Minnesota. 00:14:37.330 --> 00:14:41.710 align:middle line:84% The horse, Comanche, the only survivor of the Little Bighorn, 00:14:41.710 --> 00:14:45.310 align:middle line:90% June 25, 1876. 00:14:45.310 --> 00:14:49.360 align:middle line:84% He stood in his glass case with some drums and war clubs, 00:14:49.360 --> 00:14:53.830 align:middle line:84% some sage grass, and a few bleached bones to give him 00:14:53.830 --> 00:14:57.730 align:middle line:84% the still-on-the-prairie look, his dark eye like a buckeye, 00:14:57.730 --> 00:15:02.140 align:middle line:84% his bridle marked 7th Cavalry, his body restored with excelsior 00:15:02.140 --> 00:15:04.270 align:middle line:90% and wood and a few bones. 00:15:04.270 --> 00:15:07.180 align:middle line:84% The mount of Captain Myles Keough, a plaque 00:15:07.180 --> 00:15:10.900 align:middle line:84% explains, the only living thing found on the battlefield 00:15:10.900 --> 00:15:14.170 align:middle line:84% by relief troops arriving two days later. 00:15:14.170 --> 00:15:17.230 align:middle line:84% The horses that could walk were led off by the Indians-- 00:15:17.230 --> 00:15:22.360 align:middle line:84% Cheyenne, probably, though other bands gathered against Custer. 00:15:22.360 --> 00:15:25.390 align:middle line:84% Now we pay toll at the end of the Kansas turnpike, 00:15:25.390 --> 00:15:28.840 align:middle line:84% and I look for highway 35 to take north to Minnesota-- 00:15:28.840 --> 00:15:31.270 align:middle line:84% nearly eight hours away, and it's already 00:15:31.270 --> 00:15:33.160 align:middle line:90% 5 o'clock in the afternoon. 00:15:33.160 --> 00:15:35.740 align:middle line:84% And there off in the distance is Kansas City, 00:15:35.740 --> 00:15:38.350 align:middle line:84% and the rain isn't falling except in big drops 00:15:38.350 --> 00:15:40.810 align:middle line:84% off the viaducts, and under overpasses 00:15:40.810 --> 00:15:44.560 align:middle line:84% and what washes up from cars ahead of us. 00:15:44.560 --> 00:15:47.080 align:middle line:84% We pass the refineries and storage silos 00:15:47.080 --> 00:15:50.620 align:middle line:84% like a tribe of ancestors, then the old stockyards where 00:15:50.620 --> 00:15:55.120 align:middle line:84% my father came as a young man 70 years ago and lived his life, 00:15:55.120 --> 00:15:57.250 align:middle line:90% and now it's over. 00:15:57.250 --> 00:16:00.100 align:middle line:84% I wonder what it was like for Comanche, that first 00:16:00.100 --> 00:16:03.310 align:middle line:84% and second night he lay on the prairie by himself. 00:16:03.310 --> 00:16:06.490 align:middle line:84% Maybe he heard the moans of the dying soldiers. 00:16:06.490 --> 00:16:08.890 align:middle line:84% He must have heard the Indians at their work 00:16:08.890 --> 00:16:11.650 align:middle line:84% of scalping and dismembering and gathering up 00:16:11.650 --> 00:16:14.890 align:middle line:84% what could be carried off, as though the battle were over, 00:16:14.890 --> 00:16:17.230 align:middle line:84% and the booty of boots and brass buttons 00:16:17.230 --> 00:16:21.760 align:middle line:84% and epaulets and war weapons and rifles were really theirs. 00:16:21.760 --> 00:16:25.540 align:middle line:84% At first, the sleet is delicate as a gourd rattle, 00:16:25.540 --> 00:16:29.410 align:middle line:84% as delicate as the rattle in a burnt out light bulb. 00:16:29.410 --> 00:16:32.470 align:middle line:84% A few miles later, the sleet pecks harder. 00:16:32.470 --> 00:16:35.920 align:middle line:84% The highway is fragile as glass in a light bulb. 00:16:35.920 --> 00:16:39.250 align:middle line:84% We expected fog in Iowa, some icy roads, 00:16:39.250 --> 00:16:42.940 align:middle line:84% but we hear on the radio of the snow in St Paul. 00:16:42.940 --> 00:16:45.490 align:middle line:90% Temperatures down to below zero. 00:16:45.490 --> 00:16:48.010 align:middle line:84% I watch the white line to stay on the road. 00:16:48.010 --> 00:16:52.630 align:middle line:84% My friend watches ahead for the red tail lights of other cars. 00:16:52.630 --> 00:16:55.390 align:middle line:84% Several hours later, in Minnesota, the highway 00:16:55.390 --> 00:16:58.120 align:middle line:84% is nothing more than a few ruts through the snow. 00:16:58.120 --> 00:17:02.800 align:middle line:84% I keep driving, thinking of the power of the ancestors. 00:17:02.800 --> 00:17:04.839 align:middle line:84% When we get to St Paul, I even make it 00:17:04.839 --> 00:17:07.390 align:middle line:84% up the hill on Randolph Boulevard, 00:17:07.390 --> 00:17:10.180 align:middle line:84% make it within a few blocks of my house, 00:17:10.180 --> 00:17:12.130 align:middle line:84% but my street has not been plowed, 00:17:12.130 --> 00:17:14.589 align:middle line:84% and I have to leave my car in a snow bank 00:17:14.589 --> 00:17:16.480 align:middle line:90% at the end of the street. 00:17:16.480 --> 00:17:21.400 align:middle line:84% There's snow over the wheel wells, and the car won't move. 00:17:21.400 --> 00:17:23.829 align:middle line:84% We walk through snow up to our knees. 00:17:23.829 --> 00:17:27.770 align:middle line:84% I feel it inside my boots and the legs of my trousers. 00:17:27.770 --> 00:17:29.830 align:middle line:84% I even struggle to get into the house 00:17:29.830 --> 00:17:32.770 align:middle line:84% through the snow packed against the front door. 00:17:32.770 --> 00:17:35.530 align:middle line:84% We make several trips back to unload the car, 00:17:35.530 --> 00:17:39.520 align:middle line:84% lifting our four feet through the snow, the dark sky over us, 00:17:39.520 --> 00:17:42.670 align:middle line:84% the moans of the dying storm around us, 00:17:42.670 --> 00:17:45.940 align:middle line:84% the white air of our breath among the war shields and war 00:17:45.940 --> 00:17:47.755 align:middle line:90% clubs and ghost drums." 00:17:47.755 --> 00:17:52.740 align:middle line:90% 00:17:52.740 --> 00:17:54.690 align:middle line:84% I also wanted to read that piece for you 00:17:54.690 --> 00:17:58.530 align:middle line:84% so that you know all the snow that you are missing down here. 00:17:58.530 --> 00:18:00.466 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:18:00.466 --> 00:18:07.730 align:middle line:90% 00:18:07.730 --> 00:18:10.400 align:middle line:84% Well, this is a piece I've never read before, so it 00:18:10.400 --> 00:18:13.040 align:middle line:90% feels like a stranger to me. 00:18:13.040 --> 00:18:17.400 align:middle line:90% "Television is the West Pole." 00:18:17.400 --> 00:18:20.160 align:middle line:84% "It's a story preserved with many voices-- 00:18:20.160 --> 00:18:23.100 align:middle line:84% telling it on their own channel, you see-- 00:18:23.100 --> 00:18:27.450 align:middle line:84% sometimes associated with snow, which some stories can only 00:18:27.450 --> 00:18:29.280 align:middle line:90% be told during. 00:18:29.280 --> 00:18:33.930 align:middle line:84% Yo, TV'S the new oral tradition, continuing stories 00:18:33.930 --> 00:18:37.590 align:middle line:90% which alter our consciousness. 00:18:37.590 --> 00:18:40.650 align:middle line:84% Have you had a house in which one room was empty? 00:18:40.650 --> 00:18:43.080 align:middle line:84% You didn't have any furniture for it? 00:18:43.080 --> 00:18:45.990 align:middle line:84% That's what my Indian heritage feels like-- 00:18:45.990 --> 00:18:48.480 align:middle line:84% an empty room, maybe some curtains 00:18:48.480 --> 00:18:51.000 align:middle line:84% at the window, a few memories of old trips 00:18:51.000 --> 00:18:54.270 align:middle line:84% to see the grandmother, all when I was small. 00:18:54.270 --> 00:18:56.760 align:middle line:84% The going back along the old road, 00:18:56.760 --> 00:18:59.550 align:middle line:84% the upholstery in the back seat of the old car 00:18:59.550 --> 00:19:02.040 align:middle line:90% scratching my legs. 00:19:02.040 --> 00:19:05.820 align:middle line:84% Bookshelves empty, whole histories unknown. 00:19:05.820 --> 00:19:08.310 align:middle line:84% Maybe the bed of a few stories you 00:19:08.310 --> 00:19:10.890 align:middle line:84% know you can rest in now and then, 00:19:10.890 --> 00:19:13.680 align:middle line:84% but it's narrow as the body that's on it. 00:19:13.680 --> 00:19:16.950 align:middle line:84% The spread, a little rumpled, wrinkles under you 00:19:16.950 --> 00:19:18.030 align:middle line:90% in the wrong place. 00:19:18.030 --> 00:19:20.760 align:middle line:90% 00:19:20.760 --> 00:19:22.740 align:middle line:84% I can tell you what it's like to be Indian. 00:19:22.740 --> 00:19:25.530 align:middle line:84% It's having an invisible self to talk to. 00:19:25.530 --> 00:19:28.950 align:middle line:84% It's having an attic and knowing you're part of the land, 00:19:28.950 --> 00:19:33.150 align:middle line:84% like feeling full just after half a blueberry pie, 00:19:33.150 --> 00:19:36.270 align:middle line:90% the berries you picked yourself. 00:19:36.270 --> 00:19:38.730 align:middle line:84% When I go to powwows, I get in tears in my eyes 00:19:38.730 --> 00:19:40.740 align:middle line:90% watching those girls dance. 00:19:40.740 --> 00:19:42.330 align:middle line:90% I missed all that. 00:19:42.330 --> 00:19:45.420 align:middle line:84% I don't think they had powwows in Arkansas anyway. 00:19:45.420 --> 00:19:47.490 align:middle line:90% My father was cut off from it. 00:19:47.490 --> 00:19:49.410 align:middle line:84% My white mother wouldn't allow it. 00:19:49.410 --> 00:19:51.600 align:middle line:84% All that noise and dancing, it would 00:19:51.600 --> 00:19:53.730 align:middle line:90% have taken away the isolation. 00:19:53.730 --> 00:19:58.170 align:middle line:84% That's what my childhood was, living on the great ice cap. 00:19:58.170 --> 00:20:00.510 align:middle line:84% The frozen island of the ice-blue light 00:20:00.510 --> 00:20:03.900 align:middle line:84% on the television in the dark all the while moving, 00:20:03.900 --> 00:20:07.410 align:middle line:84% migrating with the current, Kansas City to Indianapolis 00:20:07.410 --> 00:20:09.720 align:middle line:84% to St Louis to Columbia to Tulsa, 00:20:09.720 --> 00:20:14.410 align:middle line:84% to Kansas City to Tulsa to Iowa City, to St Paul, Minnesota. 00:20:14.410 --> 00:20:17.040 align:middle line:84% I spent most of my life packing and moving. 00:20:17.040 --> 00:20:19.320 align:middle line:84% Sometimes time goes by, and I wake up 00:20:19.320 --> 00:20:22.680 align:middle line:84% and want to wad newspapers and wrap the dishes in newspaper 00:20:22.680 --> 00:20:23.910 align:middle line:90% and box them up. 00:20:23.910 --> 00:20:27.570 align:middle line:84% Yes, I can hear the silverware like a jingle dress, sewn 00:20:27.570 --> 00:20:31.080 align:middle line:84% in patterns, all fringe like-- well, I don't know. 00:20:31.080 --> 00:20:33.720 align:middle line:84% Some things you got to leave unexplained. 00:20:33.720 --> 00:20:36.150 align:middle line:84% But the drumming and the stomping with the feet, it's 00:20:36.150 --> 00:20:36.780 align:middle line:90% tricky. 00:20:36.780 --> 00:20:39.150 align:middle line:84% You just don't get out there and do it. 00:20:39.150 --> 00:20:41.400 align:middle line:84% But I didn't get to have it when I was a child. 00:20:41.400 --> 00:20:42.810 align:middle line:90% No, it's what I miss. 00:20:42.810 --> 00:20:45.300 align:middle line:84% My eyes tear up, and I have to swallow and look 00:20:45.300 --> 00:20:48.270 align:middle line:84% somewhere else for a while until they stop. 00:20:48.270 --> 00:20:50.940 align:middle line:84% And afterwards, I put my blanket on the hardwood floor 00:20:50.940 --> 00:20:53.220 align:middle line:84% of the empty room, I go to bed, and I 00:20:53.220 --> 00:20:57.060 align:middle line:84% can see the geometric patterns and the movement of something 00:20:57.060 --> 00:20:57.990 align:middle line:90% within me. 00:20:57.990 --> 00:21:01.500 align:middle line:84% Yes, that's where the Indian lives in his (tele)vision--" 00:21:01.500 --> 00:21:04.650 align:middle line:84% and tele is in parentheses, and the vision is afterwards-- 00:21:04.650 --> 00:21:07.920 align:middle line:84% "in the dance of the unknown memory. 00:21:07.920 --> 00:21:12.000 align:middle line:84% The West Pole is having the TV as a companion. 00:21:12.000 --> 00:21:14.580 align:middle line:84% Well, this is how the Indian created nature. 00:21:14.580 --> 00:21:17.580 align:middle line:84% He carved a round bowl of wood and painted it bright, 00:21:17.580 --> 00:21:20.520 align:middle line:84% with silver and copper and uranium, 00:21:20.520 --> 00:21:23.040 align:middle line:90% and shining with 100 fireflies-- 00:21:23.040 --> 00:21:26.430 align:middle line:84% runners who take it up to the sky, who broadcast it 00:21:26.430 --> 00:21:30.690 align:middle line:84% with some maple sap to stick it up there where it can transmit. 00:21:30.690 --> 00:21:34.320 align:middle line:84% Stars are the broken voices where the story pours out-- 00:21:34.320 --> 00:21:38.370 align:middle line:84% the assimilated mixed-blood voices of this age. 00:21:38.370 --> 00:21:42.300 align:middle line:84% Now, the Sun went on its track each day, and howled like a woof 00:21:42.300 --> 00:21:43.710 align:middle line:90% over the next ridge. 00:21:43.710 --> 00:21:46.860 align:middle line:84% A-ooh, a-ooh, like that, you know, a-ooh 00:21:46.860 --> 00:21:49.290 align:middle line:84% all night, especially the Moon, which 00:21:49.290 --> 00:21:53.400 align:middle line:84% is only a reflection of the Sun, yes with those stars. 00:21:53.400 --> 00:21:55.920 align:middle line:84% I want to see that Moon when it comes out, yes, I 00:21:55.920 --> 00:21:59.280 align:middle line:84% do, opening the picture show of the stars in town, 00:21:59.280 --> 00:22:02.340 align:middle line:84% sometimes full face, sometimes looking out 00:22:02.340 --> 00:22:05.670 align:middle line:84% behind the door of her room there in the night sky, 00:22:05.670 --> 00:22:08.430 align:middle line:84% sometime with their mouth on her. 00:22:08.430 --> 00:22:11.310 align:middle line:84% That's the rounded black curve you see in the moon. 00:22:11.310 --> 00:22:12.990 align:middle line:90% You know we don't know anything. 00:22:12.990 --> 00:22:16.500 align:middle line:84% Whole worlds are going on here, and we don't always know it. 00:22:16.500 --> 00:22:18.420 align:middle line:84% Yes, that's what we get for thinking 00:22:18.420 --> 00:22:22.830 align:middle line:84% we're so smart, just chugging on our own little trail each day. 00:22:22.830 --> 00:22:25.680 align:middle line:84% I tell you, my life reads like a roadmap. 00:22:25.680 --> 00:22:29.790 align:middle line:84% And what does the world look like through blue eyes? 00:22:29.790 --> 00:22:31.290 align:middle line:90% Grandpa played marbles. 00:22:31.290 --> 00:22:33.060 align:middle line:90% Yes, he was a sharpshooter. 00:22:33.060 --> 00:22:35.460 align:middle line:84% No animals in the woods to hunt anymore. 00:22:35.460 --> 00:22:39.120 align:middle line:84% He shot those round, shiny balls with swirls of red and blue, 00:22:39.120 --> 00:22:41.550 align:middle line:84% just under the surface where you couldn't 00:22:41.550 --> 00:22:42.900 align:middle line:90% put your finger on them. 00:22:42.900 --> 00:22:45.690 align:middle line:84% No legs or tails or ears to worry about. 00:22:45.690 --> 00:22:49.560 align:middle line:84% Nothing but the click of marbles, the click of a glass. 00:22:49.560 --> 00:22:50.910 align:middle line:90% What does it matter? 00:22:50.910 --> 00:22:54.270 align:middle line:84% If I turned into an animal, I'd want to become a marble. 00:22:54.270 --> 00:22:58.470 align:middle line:84% I can feel my legs falling off, my arms and my hair. 00:22:58.470 --> 00:23:02.370 align:middle line:84% I can feel myself starting to fall, yes, right off this Earth. 00:23:02.370 --> 00:23:05.760 align:middle line:84% Soon I'll be up there like one of those shiny marble stars, 00:23:05.760 --> 00:23:07.965 align:middle line:90% marbley and slick as breath." 00:23:07.965 --> 00:23:14.980 align:middle line:90% 00:23:14.980 --> 00:23:17.560 align:middle line:84% I am not really sure exactly what that means, 00:23:17.560 --> 00:23:19.750 align:middle line:84% but you know how some things move 00:23:19.750 --> 00:23:24.400 align:middle line:84% in the peripheral vision, kind of like the dream, kind 00:23:24.400 --> 00:23:27.960 align:middle line:90% of like the unconscious. 00:23:27.960 --> 00:23:34.770 align:middle line:84% And I like to get them down, too, as well as narrative poems. 00:23:34.770 --> 00:23:36.750 align:middle line:84% I think stories speak with many voices. 00:23:36.750 --> 00:23:45.600 align:middle line:90% 00:23:45.600 --> 00:23:50.400 align:middle line:84% This is from a manuscript called "(Ado)ration." 00:23:50.400 --> 00:23:51.560 align:middle line:90% And again, the ado-- 00:23:51.560 --> 00:23:53.618 align:middle line:84% A-D-O-- is in parentheses, and the ration 00:23:53.618 --> 00:23:55.410 align:middle line:84% is out there by itself, because I've always 00:23:55.410 --> 00:23:59.700 align:middle line:84% had to ration my adoration of the world. 00:23:59.700 --> 00:24:02.640 align:middle line:84% "You know the Indian, when first he saw a man on a horse, 00:24:02.640 --> 00:24:05.550 align:middle line:90% said, whoa, a four-legged. 00:24:05.550 --> 00:24:08.130 align:middle line:84% Six, really, though two legs unusable 00:24:08.130 --> 00:24:10.080 align:middle line:90% because they were too short. 00:24:10.080 --> 00:24:13.950 align:middle line:84% But a four-legged with two hands, two heads, a mane, 00:24:13.950 --> 00:24:16.230 align:middle line:90% and an amazing tail. 00:24:16.230 --> 00:24:19.770 align:middle line:84% Then, if that wasn't enough, the creature came apart from itself, 00:24:19.770 --> 00:24:21.630 align:middle line:84% could actually dismount the other 00:24:21.630 --> 00:24:24.600 align:middle line:84% in a truly emblematic reference, by which you 00:24:24.600 --> 00:24:29.490 align:middle line:84% discover the binary trail you'll probably be on the rest of life. 00:24:29.490 --> 00:24:33.780 align:middle line:84% And you saddle up, as if Jesus on a motorcycle with an angel 00:24:33.780 --> 00:24:35.310 align:middle line:90% driving the sidecar. 00:24:35.310 --> 00:24:39.750 align:middle line:84% Yes, the angels, hand-raised as if riding in a rodeo, 00:24:39.750 --> 00:24:41.280 align:middle line:84% reaching through a hole in the air, 00:24:41.280 --> 00:24:44.250 align:middle line:84% and it's like putting your finger into a light socket 00:24:44.250 --> 00:24:46.020 align:middle line:90% and you're wired. 00:24:46.020 --> 00:24:48.090 align:middle line:84% You bunny-hop with the conquistadors, 00:24:48.090 --> 00:24:50.310 align:middle line:90% riding the horse up from Mexico. 00:24:50.310 --> 00:24:52.920 align:middle line:84% Being extinct on the North American continent 00:24:52.920 --> 00:24:57.330 align:middle line:84% since the Ice Age, now, after crossing on ships from Española, 00:24:57.330 --> 00:24:58.560 align:middle line:90% they come back. 00:24:58.560 --> 00:25:01.320 align:middle line:84% Yep, maybe it's the speed of the Harley. 00:25:01.320 --> 00:25:05.730 align:middle line:84% Maybe it's the bleeding heart of Jesus flapping on his chest. 00:25:05.730 --> 00:25:07.350 align:middle line:90% No T-shirt logo. 00:25:07.350 --> 00:25:10.830 align:middle line:84% No, Jesus is quick as a whip-tail lizard. 00:25:10.830 --> 00:25:13.170 align:middle line:84% You feel him running through your insides, 00:25:13.170 --> 00:25:16.320 align:middle line:84% washing the hurt, the mean-spirited stuff 00:25:16.320 --> 00:25:17.610 align:middle line:90% you have done. 00:25:17.610 --> 00:25:19.620 align:middle line:84% You remember as a child, you heard him 00:25:19.620 --> 00:25:21.870 align:middle line:90% rolling like a loose hubcap. 00:25:21.870 --> 00:25:25.140 align:middle line:84% You knew him in high school, smoking with the gang 00:25:25.140 --> 00:25:26.610 align:middle line:90% in the parking lot. 00:25:26.610 --> 00:25:30.630 align:middle line:84% You know how, in those days, you were always drawn to the hoods." 00:25:30.630 --> 00:25:38.750 align:middle line:90% 00:25:38.750 --> 00:25:41.930 align:middle line:90% "Theology of Deer." 00:25:41.930 --> 00:25:43.940 align:middle line:90% "The Jazz bows of Earth. 00:25:43.940 --> 00:25:47.660 align:middle line:84% Their roll through space, traveling farther each day. 00:25:47.660 --> 00:25:49.580 align:middle line:90% The cherubim on drums. 00:25:49.580 --> 00:25:51.230 align:middle line:90% A trumpet of angels. 00:25:51.230 --> 00:25:53.120 align:middle line:90% The beats of an old life. 00:25:53.120 --> 00:25:55.230 align:middle line:90% A smaller inverted mind. 00:25:55.230 --> 00:25:57.230 align:middle line:84% When you stop that night on the road 00:25:57.230 --> 00:26:00.590 align:middle line:84% through the Cattaraugus Reserve to watch the northern lights. 00:26:00.590 --> 00:26:05.120 align:middle line:84% The crowd of spirits, their migration to the Res, 00:26:05.120 --> 00:26:09.080 align:middle line:84% tuning Indian cars, holding babies in their arms. 00:26:09.080 --> 00:26:12.230 align:middle line:84% When a deer crosses the road in the fog behind you, 00:26:12.230 --> 00:26:16.130 align:middle line:84% you think Christ for a moment it's him and you say dude 00:26:16.130 --> 00:26:18.455 align:middle line:90% of dudes and deer of deers." 00:26:18.455 --> 00:26:23.600 align:middle line:90% 00:26:23.600 --> 00:26:25.730 align:middle line:84% I've always had a very strong Christian faith 00:26:25.730 --> 00:26:28.680 align:middle line:84% and many friends, both Native and white, 00:26:28.680 --> 00:26:30.425 align:middle line:84% say how can you believe that stuff. 00:26:30.425 --> 00:26:36.620 align:middle line:90% 00:26:36.620 --> 00:26:40.430 align:middle line:84% I had a junior sabbatical last semester and I had a whole-- 00:26:40.430 --> 00:26:42.830 align:middle line:84% I think it was eight months off to write. 00:26:42.830 --> 00:26:44.540 align:middle line:84% And I finished a novel that I had 00:26:44.540 --> 00:26:48.800 align:middle line:84% been working on for many years about the Trail of Tears. 00:26:48.800 --> 00:26:53.030 align:middle line:84% The 1838 removal of the Cherokee from the Southwest-- 00:26:53.030 --> 00:26:56.090 align:middle line:90% from the Southeast to Oklahoma. 00:26:56.090 --> 00:26:58.730 align:middle line:84% And when I was down here in Tucson for two months 00:26:58.730 --> 00:27:01.760 align:middle line:84% last winter I pretty much finished it up. 00:27:01.760 --> 00:27:03.590 align:middle line:84% I also went up to the Heard Museum 00:27:03.590 --> 00:27:05.750 align:middle line:90% and did some research there. 00:27:05.750 --> 00:27:08.420 align:middle line:84% The novel is called Pushing the Bear, 00:27:08.420 --> 00:27:12.080 align:middle line:84% because there was always a dark presence, a heaviness, 00:27:12.080 --> 00:27:15.500 align:middle line:84% in front of my characters as they walked. 00:27:15.500 --> 00:27:18.430 align:middle line:90% 00:27:18.430 --> 00:27:21.400 align:middle line:84% I was in a museum in Tulsa in the basement. 00:27:21.400 --> 00:27:23.890 align:middle line:84% And once a year, they open the museum 00:27:23.890 --> 00:27:26.350 align:middle line:84% and let you go down and see all their excess. 00:27:26.350 --> 00:27:28.510 align:middle line:84% And there was a little ivory sculpture 00:27:28.510 --> 00:27:30.940 align:middle line:84% of a man leaning over pushing a bear 00:27:30.940 --> 00:27:32.740 align:middle line:84% and I knew just in an instant that would 00:27:32.740 --> 00:27:36.790 align:middle line:90% be the title of my manuscript. 00:27:36.790 --> 00:27:38.800 align:middle line:84% The main character's name is Maritole 00:27:38.800 --> 00:27:41.560 align:middle line:84% and her husband's name is Knobowtee. 00:27:41.560 --> 00:27:43.900 align:middle line:84% And Maritole is sitting on her cabin steps 00:27:43.900 --> 00:27:46.090 align:middle line:84% one morning in the fall of 1838 when 00:27:46.090 --> 00:27:47.800 align:middle line:90% she looks over the cornfields. 00:27:47.800 --> 00:27:50.330 align:middle line:90% 00:27:50.330 --> 00:27:53.570 align:middle line:84% Maritole, I heard my husband call from the field. 00:27:53.570 --> 00:27:57.050 align:middle line:84% I started to get up, but the baby tottered at my knees. 00:27:57.050 --> 00:28:00.680 align:middle line:84% Maritole, Knobowtee called again. 00:28:00.680 --> 00:28:03.920 align:middle line:84% Soldiers had rounded up Cherokee in Tennessee in North Carolina 00:28:03.920 --> 00:28:05.000 align:middle line:90% the past summer. 00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:06.890 align:middle line:84% Put them in stockades for the march 00:28:06.890 --> 00:28:10.640 align:middle line:84% West, but fever and dysentery had weakened the Indians 00:28:10.640 --> 00:28:13.100 align:middle line:84% and they went back to their farms or camps 00:28:13.100 --> 00:28:14.900 align:middle line:90% near the stockades. 00:28:14.900 --> 00:28:17.030 align:middle line:84% There couldn't be soldiers on the road. 00:28:17.030 --> 00:28:20.090 align:middle line:84% They couldn't come to the backwoods of Georgia. 00:28:20.090 --> 00:28:22.670 align:middle line:90% No matter what the men said. 00:28:22.670 --> 00:28:25.400 align:middle line:84% I saw dust swarm over the dried corn stocks 00:28:25.400 --> 00:28:27.170 align:middle line:90% in the fields near the cabin. 00:28:27.170 --> 00:28:29.030 align:middle line:90% Horses were coming. 00:28:29.030 --> 00:28:31.760 align:middle line:84% For a moment the cabin in the small clearing in the woods 00:28:31.760 --> 00:28:32.990 align:middle line:90% seemed a whirl. 00:28:32.990 --> 00:28:35.690 align:middle line:84% The baby cried, but I couldn't hold her. 00:28:35.690 --> 00:28:38.150 align:middle line:84% I saw Knobowtee walk between the mounted soldiers 00:28:38.150 --> 00:28:39.230 align:middle line:90% into the clearing. 00:28:39.230 --> 00:28:44.600 align:middle line:84% I stood at the cabin steps and the baby slipped from my knees. 00:28:44.600 --> 00:28:46.490 align:middle line:90% "I had seen the white men often. 00:28:46.490 --> 00:28:48.770 align:middle line:84% They came through New Echota to trade. 00:28:48.770 --> 00:28:51.170 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, they rode by the farm. 00:28:51.170 --> 00:28:54.590 align:middle line:84% I heard their language from the white ministers in church. 00:28:54.590 --> 00:28:56.510 align:middle line:84% They'd read from the scriptures in English, 00:28:56.510 --> 00:29:00.290 align:middle line:84% then one of our holy men would translate with his usual grunt. 00:29:00.290 --> 00:29:02.360 align:middle line:84% But there was no hope for us now. 00:29:02.360 --> 00:29:04.790 align:middle line:84% I saw the soldiers' impatient movements 00:29:04.790 --> 00:29:06.530 align:middle line:90% and heard their quick words. 00:29:06.530 --> 00:29:10.870 align:middle line:84% They seemed invisible inside their dark clothes. 00:29:10.870 --> 00:29:13.510 align:middle line:84% Some Cherokee had already migrated West. 00:29:13.510 --> 00:29:15.790 align:middle line:84% How many earlier trails had there been? 00:29:15.790 --> 00:29:17.830 align:middle line:90% But we wanted to keep our land. 00:29:17.830 --> 00:29:20.530 align:middle line:84% I stepped on the apple core that fell from my lap. 00:29:20.530 --> 00:29:24.850 align:middle line:84% The sun had burned away morning fog, and light blurred the men. 00:29:24.850 --> 00:29:26.860 align:middle line:84% I had to wash the baby's clothes. 00:29:26.860 --> 00:29:30.250 align:middle line:84% Later, I was going to take some corn to the mill in New Echota. 00:29:30.250 --> 00:29:32.860 align:middle line:84% A bushel of apples and peaches from our trees 00:29:32.860 --> 00:29:35.050 align:middle line:90% waited by the wagon. 00:29:35.050 --> 00:29:36.970 align:middle line:84% I didn't understand what the soldier said 00:29:36.970 --> 00:29:38.350 align:middle line:90% in the clearing of the cabin. 00:29:38.350 --> 00:29:39.730 align:middle line:90% They talked fast. 00:29:39.730 --> 00:29:42.760 align:middle line:84% In our own language, my husband told me to carry the baby. 00:29:42.760 --> 00:29:45.340 align:middle line:84% We were leaving for the stockade in Tennessee. 00:29:45.340 --> 00:29:47.770 align:middle line:90% Then we also would migrate West. 00:29:47.770 --> 00:29:49.420 align:middle line:90% No, I said to him. 00:29:49.420 --> 00:29:52.660 align:middle line:84% We will march, Knobowtee said, I've always known it. 00:29:52.660 --> 00:29:54.880 align:middle line:84% Chief John Ross at Red Clay, Tennessee 00:29:54.880 --> 00:29:56.890 align:middle line:84% said we had hope of keeping our land, 00:29:56.890 --> 00:29:59.140 align:middle line:84% but the chiefs here, Ridge and Boudinot, 00:29:59.140 --> 00:30:01.450 align:middle line:84% said we were right in signing the treaty. 00:30:01.450 --> 00:30:02.980 align:middle line:90% We have to leave. 00:30:02.980 --> 00:30:05.530 align:middle line:90% I won't, I said to Knobowtee. 00:30:05.530 --> 00:30:07.360 align:middle line:84% A soldier dismounted and told Knobowtee 00:30:07.360 --> 00:30:08.920 align:middle line:90% to give me the crying child. 00:30:08.920 --> 00:30:11.380 align:middle line:84% He put his bayonet to my side and poked. 00:30:11.380 --> 00:30:13.480 align:middle line:84% Knobowtee turned and walked ahead of me. 00:30:13.480 --> 00:30:16.630 align:middle line:84% I couldn't leave the farm, the cabin, and the yellow leaves 00:30:16.630 --> 00:30:19.570 align:middle line:84% where my things were, my grandmother's spinning wheels 00:30:19.570 --> 00:30:22.180 align:middle line:84% and cotton cards, her copper thimble. 00:30:22.180 --> 00:30:24.010 align:middle line:90% I felt my knees fold. 00:30:24.010 --> 00:30:26.320 align:middle line:84% The baby screamed, and Knobowtee took her. 00:30:26.320 --> 00:30:31.030 align:middle line:84% A soldier lifted me to my feet, and I knew he said, march. 00:30:31.030 --> 00:30:32.650 align:middle line:90% They couldn't remove us. 00:30:32.650 --> 00:30:34.930 align:middle line:84% Didn't the soldiers know we were the land? 00:30:34.930 --> 00:30:37.180 align:middle line:84% The corn stalks were our grandmothers. 00:30:37.180 --> 00:30:41.230 align:middle line:84% Long ago, Selu, a Cherokee woman, had been killed. 00:30:41.230 --> 00:30:43.630 align:middle line:84% Where her blood fell, the corn grew. 00:30:43.630 --> 00:30:47.110 align:middle line:84% The corn stalks waved their arms, trying to hold us. 00:30:47.110 --> 00:30:50.320 align:middle line:84% Their voices were the long tassels, reaching the air. 00:30:50.320 --> 00:30:52.780 align:middle line:90% Our roots entwined. 00:30:52.780 --> 00:30:56.050 align:middle line:84% My feet would not walk, and the soldier held me up by my arm. 00:30:56.050 --> 00:30:58.570 align:middle line:84% I walked sideways, and fell into the corn stalks 00:30:58.570 --> 00:31:00.070 align:middle line:90% at the side of the road. 00:31:00.070 --> 00:31:02.500 align:middle line:90% A bird's chirp filled my ears. 00:31:02.500 --> 00:31:05.170 align:middle line:84% I wanted to hold the air and the sound of the land. 00:31:05.170 --> 00:31:08.470 align:middle line:84% The soldiers laughed and poked me with his bayonet. 00:31:08.470 --> 00:31:11.410 align:middle line:84% I thought for a moment, his face was painted blue. 00:31:11.410 --> 00:31:14.260 align:middle line:84% I tried to get up, but my knees wouldn't hold. 00:31:14.260 --> 00:31:18.550 align:middle line:84% I saw the apple core in my hand and wondered how it got there. 00:31:18.550 --> 00:31:21.190 align:middle line:84% Wagon, the soldier said and pulled me out 00:31:21.190 --> 00:31:22.810 align:middle line:90% of the corn stalks. 00:31:22.810 --> 00:31:25.960 align:middle line:84% I tried to follow Knobowtee, but I walked like I was old. 00:31:25.960 --> 00:31:28.870 align:middle line:84% I was my grandmother before she died, when her knees would not 00:31:28.870 --> 00:31:29.800 align:middle line:90% hold her up. 00:31:29.800 --> 00:31:31.990 align:middle line:84% I heard the soldiers laugh again. 00:31:31.990 --> 00:31:34.780 align:middle line:84% Walk straight, Knobowtee carried the baby and looked at me. 00:31:34.780 --> 00:31:36.370 align:middle line:90% We don't have any choice. 00:31:36.370 --> 00:31:37.900 align:middle line:90% There'll be a wagon ahead. 00:31:37.900 --> 00:31:41.290 align:middle line:90% You and the baby can ride. 00:31:41.290 --> 00:31:42.910 align:middle line:84% I looked back at the cabin, but we 00:31:42.910 --> 00:31:45.280 align:middle line:84% had passed the first bend in the wagon ruts. 00:31:45.280 --> 00:31:47.560 align:middle line:84% My grandmother's scissors, and her bone hairpin, 00:31:47.560 --> 00:31:49.570 align:middle line:84% and the shell beads were on my dresser. 00:31:49.570 --> 00:31:52.870 align:middle line:84% The bed my father helped Knobowtee make, the nutting 00:31:52.870 --> 00:31:55.930 align:middle line:84% stone and pestles he gave me when we married, 00:31:55.930 --> 00:31:57.250 align:middle line:90% I couldn't leave. 00:31:57.250 --> 00:32:00.760 align:middle line:84% My grandmother's things had been given me to take care of. 00:32:00.760 --> 00:32:03.610 align:middle line:84% Sometimes, I still heard her voice in the cabin. 00:32:03.610 --> 00:32:06.130 align:middle line:84% The white sky passed before my eyes, 00:32:06.130 --> 00:32:09.160 align:middle line:84% and I felt myself hit the hard ground. 00:32:09.160 --> 00:32:11.860 align:middle line:84% The rumble of the wagon startled me from blackness. 00:32:11.860 --> 00:32:12.970 align:middle line:90% I sat up. 00:32:12.970 --> 00:32:15.070 align:middle line:84% Knobowtee walked beside the wagon, 00:32:15.070 --> 00:32:17.800 align:middle line:84% and Anna Sco-so-tah held my baby. 00:32:17.800 --> 00:32:20.260 align:middle line:84% The wagon was crowded, and I tried to make room 00:32:20.260 --> 00:32:24.460 align:middle line:84% for the others, Kee-un-e-ca and the widow Teehe, Lacey Woodard, 00:32:24.460 --> 00:32:27.100 align:middle line:90% Quaty Lewis, Mrs. Young Turkey. 00:32:27.100 --> 00:32:29.290 align:middle line:84% The wheels jolted over the ground, 00:32:29.290 --> 00:32:31.150 align:middle line:84% and I held the side of the wagon. 00:32:31.150 --> 00:32:33.280 align:middle line:84% A terrible silence fell over our people, 00:32:33.280 --> 00:32:37.450 align:middle line:84% thick as the fog that sometime covered us in the morning. 00:32:37.450 --> 00:32:39.430 align:middle line:84% Chief John Ross had gone to Washington 00:32:39.430 --> 00:32:42.880 align:middle line:84% from Red Clay, Tennessee, but the Ridge and Boudinot faction 00:32:42.880 --> 00:32:46.690 align:middle line:84% in Georgia knew the Indian had no chance to keep his land. 00:32:46.690 --> 00:32:49.390 align:middle line:84% I heard the men's angry voices in council. 00:32:49.390 --> 00:32:52.210 align:middle line:84% Andrew Jackson would not uphold the agreement that 00:32:52.210 --> 00:32:54.400 align:middle line:90% kept Indian lands for Indians. 00:32:54.400 --> 00:32:55.990 align:middle line:84% My father said the white men were 00:32:55.990 --> 00:32:59.200 align:middle line:84% still angry we had joined the British during the Revolutionary 00:32:59.200 --> 00:32:59.980 align:middle line:90% War. 00:32:59.980 --> 00:33:02.740 align:middle line:84% Then gold was discovered in northern Georgia, 00:33:02.740 --> 00:33:04.540 align:middle line:90% and the white men wanted it. 00:33:04.540 --> 00:33:06.550 align:middle line:90% They also wanted our farms. 00:33:06.550 --> 00:33:09.310 align:middle line:84% Knobowtee said again, we didn't have a chance. 00:33:09.310 --> 00:33:12.040 align:middle line:84% I looked at him as he walked beside the wagon. 00:33:12.040 --> 00:33:13.855 align:middle line:90% He seemed a stranger to me. 00:33:13.855 --> 00:33:17.930 align:middle line:90% 00:33:17.930 --> 00:33:20.500 align:middle line:84% I thought of the birds and the geese, the curl of wood smoke 00:33:20.500 --> 00:33:22.420 align:middle line:84% and the chirp of bugs from the woods. 00:33:22.420 --> 00:33:24.550 align:middle line:90% The trees were our ancestors. 00:33:24.550 --> 00:33:27.640 align:middle line:84% Their roots reached fingers into the creek banks. 00:33:27.640 --> 00:33:30.880 align:middle line:84% The squirrels ate walnuts and fussed in their branches. 00:33:30.880 --> 00:33:33.340 align:middle line:84% I wanted to hear the buzz of a fly around me 00:33:33.340 --> 00:33:34.780 align:middle line:90% on the cabin steps. 00:33:34.780 --> 00:33:38.200 align:middle line:84% The corn fields and land surrounded me all my life. 00:33:38.200 --> 00:33:40.600 align:middle line:84% We were made of the red soil we farmed. 00:33:40.600 --> 00:33:43.930 align:middle line:84% Now, the dust roads seemed to flare like cooking fires. 00:33:43.930 --> 00:33:47.050 align:middle line:84% I thought once I heard the thunder of the Great Spirit's 00:33:47.050 --> 00:33:48.850 align:middle line:90% anger against the soldiers. 00:33:48.850 --> 00:33:50.800 align:middle line:90% I looked at them from the wagon. 00:33:50.800 --> 00:33:53.050 align:middle line:90% Their boots dusty from the road. 00:33:53.050 --> 00:33:55.540 align:middle line:90% Their uniforms like bruises. 00:33:55.540 --> 00:33:58.450 align:middle line:84% The wagons passed easier over the pine needles. 00:33:58.450 --> 00:34:00.700 align:middle line:84% The baby slept for a moment on my lap, 00:34:00.700 --> 00:34:03.370 align:middle line:84% but woke with a toss of the wagon. 00:34:03.370 --> 00:34:05.980 align:middle line:84% I thought of the chickens on the farm and the crops 00:34:05.980 --> 00:34:09.159 align:middle line:84% I had to tend, butter not yet made. 00:34:09.159 --> 00:34:11.429 align:middle line:84% Knobowtee was in the field, cutting the dried corn 00:34:11.429 --> 00:34:14.639 align:middle line:84% stocks for fodder, when the soldiers came. 00:34:14.639 --> 00:34:16.980 align:middle line:84% Did he leave the horse hitched to the plow? 00:34:16.980 --> 00:34:18.600 align:middle line:90% What would happen to it? 00:34:18.600 --> 00:34:22.530 align:middle line:84% Where was the young raccoon that came to the cabin step to feed? 00:34:22.530 --> 00:34:24.090 align:middle line:90% What would happen to us? 00:34:24.090 --> 00:34:27.570 align:middle line:84% The Cherokee men walked in their turbans and tunics. 00:34:27.570 --> 00:34:29.940 align:middle line:84% The bright colors made the soldiers' uniforms 00:34:29.940 --> 00:34:31.500 align:middle line:90% sink into the trees. 00:34:31.500 --> 00:34:33.840 align:middle line:84% The autumn sun shone on our heads, 00:34:33.840 --> 00:34:37.739 align:middle line:84% lighting the black hair and eyes that were dark and strained." 00:34:37.739 --> 00:34:41.730 align:middle line:90% 00:34:41.730 --> 00:34:45.025 align:middle line:84% The novel, which goes on for 400 pages-- 00:34:45.025 --> 00:34:46.650 align:middle line:84% actually, a little bit more than that-- 00:34:46.650 --> 00:34:49.170 align:middle line:90% is full of different characters. 00:34:49.170 --> 00:34:52.350 align:middle line:84% I wrote it the first time with just Maritole walking 00:34:52.350 --> 00:34:56.550 align:middle line:84% the 900 miles, making 10 miles a day through the four winter 00:34:56.550 --> 00:34:58.290 align:middle line:90% months of 1838. 00:34:58.290 --> 00:35:00.940 align:middle line:84% But that one voice didn't carry the story, 00:35:00.940 --> 00:35:04.860 align:middle line:84% so I went back and added all the other voices. 00:35:04.860 --> 00:35:08.400 align:middle line:84% Some of the names came like magic. 00:35:08.400 --> 00:35:13.020 align:middle line:84% This one is called Jelest, J- E-L- E-S-T, 00:35:13.020 --> 00:35:18.570 align:middle line:84% and whether through hysteria, or whether it actually happened, 00:35:18.570 --> 00:35:19.830 align:middle line:90% or whether she went crazy-- 00:35:19.830 --> 00:35:23.430 align:middle line:84% I don't know-- this is about an animal transformation, 00:35:23.430 --> 00:35:26.550 align:middle line:90% and this is her speaking. 00:35:26.550 --> 00:35:29.280 align:middle line:84% "You soldiers, I knew you were coming. 00:35:29.280 --> 00:35:29.970 align:middle line:90% Ha! 00:35:29.970 --> 00:35:32.100 align:middle line:90% You didn't startle me. 00:35:32.100 --> 00:35:35.670 align:middle line:84% The baby who was born talking said you were coming. 00:35:35.670 --> 00:35:38.460 align:middle line:90% It was a Choolaskey, conjurers. 00:35:38.460 --> 00:35:41.970 align:middle line:84% As soon as the baby's head was out, it sang its own birth song. 00:35:41.970 --> 00:35:44.530 align:middle line:90% It said its own secret name. 00:35:44.530 --> 00:35:46.830 align:middle line:84% It said it was afraid of winter because it didn't want 00:35:46.830 --> 00:35:49.410 align:middle line:90% to be one of those who walked. 00:35:49.410 --> 00:35:52.740 align:middle line:84% The holy men made stick crosses for the four directions, 00:35:52.740 --> 00:35:55.350 align:middle line:84% and the crosses fell to the West. 00:35:55.350 --> 00:35:57.300 align:middle line:90% Even the birds are quiet. 00:35:57.300 --> 00:35:59.550 align:middle line:84% I would run from you, but my legs 00:35:59.550 --> 00:36:02.970 align:middle line:84% are stiff as the willow strips I soak in the creek. 00:36:02.970 --> 00:36:05.220 align:middle line:90% I hear your horses on the road. 00:36:05.220 --> 00:36:07.380 align:middle line:90% I know you stop at my cabin. 00:36:07.380 --> 00:36:11.340 align:middle line:84% I hear nothing but my heart beating in my ears. 00:36:11.340 --> 00:36:15.090 align:middle line:84% Maybe you are standing still, thinking what to do. 00:36:15.090 --> 00:36:18.420 align:middle line:84% I could hear your footsteps if you walk to the creek. 00:36:18.420 --> 00:36:22.350 align:middle line:84% If I were an animal, the soldiers could not find me. 00:36:22.350 --> 00:36:25.650 align:middle line:84% If I hold still, I would become a deer. 00:36:25.650 --> 00:36:28.710 align:middle line:84% I lean over the creek and lap with my tongue. 00:36:28.710 --> 00:36:33.630 align:middle line:84% I feel under my skirt for the hooves, the soft deer tail. 00:36:33.630 --> 00:36:35.370 align:middle line:90% My nostrils widen. 00:36:35.370 --> 00:36:36.810 align:middle line:90% I smell the wind. 00:36:36.810 --> 00:36:40.860 align:middle line:84% I look into the creek and see the downy ears on my head. 00:36:40.860 --> 00:36:43.710 align:middle line:84% I lift my head and step through the woods." 00:36:43.710 --> 00:36:50.680 align:middle line:90% 00:36:50.680 --> 00:36:54.340 align:middle line:84% This is Anna Sco-so-tah speaking. 00:36:54.340 --> 00:36:55.630 align:middle line:90% There's also Cherokee words. 00:36:55.630 --> 00:36:57.530 align:middle line:84% But I do not speak the Cherokee language, 00:36:57.530 --> 00:36:59.770 align:middle line:90% so I just skip over them. 00:36:59.770 --> 00:37:02.380 align:middle line:84% "The soldiers came down the road and told her to leave. 00:37:02.380 --> 00:37:03.820 align:middle line:90% Her legs wouldn't walk. 00:37:03.820 --> 00:37:06.160 align:middle line:84% The soldiers grabbed her arm and held her up. 00:37:06.160 --> 00:37:08.170 align:middle line:90% Their bayonets poked her legs. 00:37:08.170 --> 00:37:11.380 align:middle line:84% The sky was brown as the hen blood on her boots. 00:37:11.380 --> 00:37:13.000 align:middle line:84% She tried to call to her neighbor, 00:37:13.000 --> 00:37:14.410 align:middle line:90% but her voice crackled. 00:37:14.410 --> 00:37:16.570 align:middle line:84% For a moment, she thought she was a hen. 00:37:16.570 --> 00:37:22.210 align:middle line:84% She flopped on the ground, her brown feathers in the dust." 00:37:22.210 --> 00:37:26.710 align:middle line:84% And this is Anna Sco-so-tah's neighbor. 00:37:26.710 --> 00:37:28.480 align:middle line:84% "They stopped at a stream to drink. 00:37:28.480 --> 00:37:30.940 align:middle line:90% How quickly they felt thirst. 00:37:30.940 --> 00:37:33.400 align:middle line:84% The birds called to them across the trees. 00:37:33.400 --> 00:37:35.530 align:middle line:90% Even the water spoke. 00:37:35.530 --> 00:37:38.140 align:middle line:84% I heard Anna crackle, her neighbor said. 00:37:38.140 --> 00:37:40.390 align:middle line:84% I knew the soldiers was coming anyway. 00:37:40.390 --> 00:37:42.970 align:middle line:90% I've seen Anna, too, in a dream. 00:37:42.970 --> 00:37:45.490 align:middle line:84% I was in my cabin, and she came to the window. 00:37:45.490 --> 00:37:47.140 align:middle line:90% Her arms were short. 00:37:47.140 --> 00:37:48.850 align:middle line:90% They was covered with feathers. 00:37:48.850 --> 00:37:50.560 align:middle line:84% She's a witch, the neighbor said. 00:37:50.560 --> 00:37:52.840 align:middle line:90% That's all I can say. 00:37:52.840 --> 00:37:55.390 align:middle line:84% He's a sorcerer, Anna told the others. 00:37:55.390 --> 00:37:57.340 align:middle line:84% The chickens cluck when he comes. 00:37:57.340 --> 00:37:59.380 align:middle line:90% Sorcerers are night travelers. 00:37:59.380 --> 00:38:01.435 align:middle line:90% The chickens don't like them. 00:38:01.435 --> 00:38:04.750 align:middle line:84% Huh, the neighbor said, she's only got three chickens. 00:38:04.750 --> 00:38:08.230 align:middle line:84% If she eats a chicken one day, I see it walking around the next. 00:38:08.230 --> 00:38:09.790 align:middle line:90% She's a witch, I tell you. 00:38:09.790 --> 00:38:11.740 align:middle line:90% That's all I can say. 00:38:11.740 --> 00:38:14.860 align:middle line:84% The chickens peck him if I don't chase them with my stick. 00:38:14.860 --> 00:38:17.890 align:middle line:84% Huh, the neighbor grunted as the soldiers hurried on. 00:38:17.890 --> 00:38:19.990 align:middle line:84% That's how I know he's a sorcerer, 00:38:19.990 --> 00:38:23.140 align:middle line:84% Anna Sco-so-tah said, walking beside her neighbor. 00:38:23.140 --> 00:38:24.940 align:middle line:90% The chickens don't like him." 00:38:24.940 --> 00:38:28.920 align:middle line:90% 00:38:28.920 --> 00:38:32.040 align:middle line:84% So they go to a stockade in Tennessee 00:38:32.040 --> 00:38:35.130 align:middle line:84% where they stay until all the Cherokee are rounded up. 00:38:35.130 --> 00:38:39.270 align:middle line:84% And then one morning, late in October, they leave the stockade 00:38:39.270 --> 00:38:42.390 align:middle line:84% and travel North through Tennessee and Kentucky. 00:38:42.390 --> 00:38:45.900 align:middle line:84% And they come to the Ohio River, which they cross, 00:38:45.900 --> 00:38:47.910 align:middle line:84% and they cross the bottom of Illinois. 00:38:47.910 --> 00:38:52.920 align:middle line:84% And this is the next stop here at the Mississippi River. 00:38:52.920 --> 00:38:55.380 align:middle line:84% And after that, they continue across Southern Missouri, 00:38:55.380 --> 00:38:57.510 align:middle line:84% and down across the corner of Arkansas, 00:38:57.510 --> 00:38:59.130 align:middle line:90% and then into Oklahoma. 00:38:59.130 --> 00:39:02.760 align:middle line:90% 00:39:02.760 --> 00:39:04.260 align:middle line:90% This is Maritole speaking. 00:39:04.260 --> 00:39:07.350 align:middle line:84% "Suddenly, one day, we came to a huge river. 00:39:07.350 --> 00:39:09.750 align:middle line:84% The soldier said it was the Mississippi. 00:39:09.750 --> 00:39:11.760 align:middle line:84% We camped under the cover of brush 00:39:11.760 --> 00:39:14.580 align:middle line:84% and watched the ice chunks float by Green's Ferry. 00:39:14.580 --> 00:39:17.310 align:middle line:90% Sometimes, wailing was heard. 00:39:17.310 --> 00:39:20.130 align:middle line:84% Look at that terrible outcropping of rock up river. 00:39:20.130 --> 00:39:22.350 align:middle line:90% A bluff, the soldiers called it. 00:39:22.350 --> 00:39:23.940 align:middle line:84% The hills were higher than they had 00:39:23.940 --> 00:39:27.330 align:middle line:84% been when we crossed the Ohio, and weren't the trees shorter, 00:39:27.330 --> 00:39:31.210 align:middle line:84% allowing the heavy sky to push down upon us? 00:39:31.210 --> 00:39:34.110 align:middle line:84% Many more of us died waiting for the ice to pass. 00:39:34.110 --> 00:39:37.530 align:middle line:84% Knobowtee and the men, men sat spitting into the fire. 00:39:37.530 --> 00:39:40.780 align:middle line:84% I felt my fear of the river grow. 00:39:40.780 --> 00:39:42.360 align:middle line:90% How can we cross that river? 00:39:42.360 --> 00:39:45.720 align:middle line:84% I cried in panic to Tanner one evening, we'll die. 00:39:45.720 --> 00:39:47.880 align:middle line:90% We'll drown like the others. 00:39:47.880 --> 00:39:49.590 align:middle line:90% My father didn't say anything. 00:39:49.590 --> 00:39:52.620 align:middle line:84% His hair had grayed, and his eyes were dull and hollow 00:39:52.620 --> 00:39:53.880 align:middle line:90% in his head. 00:39:53.880 --> 00:39:57.780 align:middle line:84% Lucy held her boys, we'll make it the rest of the way. 00:39:57.780 --> 00:40:00.540 align:middle line:84% I watched the ice pass for a few more days. 00:40:00.540 --> 00:40:03.120 align:middle line:84% Then one morning, I woke with the taste of peaches 00:40:03.120 --> 00:40:04.230 align:middle line:90% in my mouth. 00:40:04.230 --> 00:40:07.660 align:middle line:84% I heard the soldiers preparing to cross the river. 00:40:07.660 --> 00:40:10.180 align:middle line:84% We had always been toward the front of the line. 00:40:10.180 --> 00:40:12.540 align:middle line:84% We would be among the first ones to cross. 00:40:12.540 --> 00:40:14.580 align:middle line:90% My heart pounded wildly. 00:40:14.580 --> 00:40:18.060 align:middle line:84% I held something in my hands, but always, always, I 00:40:18.060 --> 00:40:20.040 align:middle line:90% found they were empty. 00:40:20.040 --> 00:40:22.320 align:middle line:84% The bear camped before me as usual. 00:40:22.320 --> 00:40:25.920 align:middle line:84% I tried to push him away, but his bulk did not move. 00:40:25.920 --> 00:40:29.670 align:middle line:84% I felt the stirring of his breath on the cold morning. 00:40:29.670 --> 00:40:33.120 align:middle line:84% Old bear, I said to him, today we crossed the river. 00:40:33.120 --> 00:40:37.380 align:middle line:84% I patted his hide, move over, even if I go to the afterlife 00:40:37.380 --> 00:40:39.780 align:middle line:90% with mother and the baby. 00:40:39.780 --> 00:40:42.030 align:middle line:84% The boys fretted as we waited for the raft that 00:40:42.030 --> 00:40:44.010 align:middle line:90% would take us across the river. 00:40:44.010 --> 00:40:46.710 align:middle line:84% They cried frantically when the soldiers herded us 00:40:46.710 --> 00:40:48.060 align:middle line:90% toward the landing. 00:40:48.060 --> 00:40:51.840 align:middle line:84% I felt a tightness in my chest, and my arms hurt. 00:40:51.840 --> 00:40:53.910 align:middle line:84% Surely, the land and the trail we walked 00:40:53.910 --> 00:40:56.460 align:middle line:84% would fold under the earth with the sun. 00:40:56.460 --> 00:40:58.080 align:middle line:90% I nodded to the trees. 00:40:58.080 --> 00:41:00.120 align:middle line:90% We go, I told the boys. 00:41:00.120 --> 00:41:02.730 align:middle line:84% They would not hold still, but tried to run. 00:41:02.730 --> 00:41:05.130 align:middle line:90% Don't run, I told them again. 00:41:05.130 --> 00:41:08.160 align:middle line:84% Above us, the clouds wore my grandmother's bone hair-- 00:41:08.160 --> 00:41:09.840 align:middle line:90% bone carved hairpin. 00:41:09.840 --> 00:41:13.170 align:middle line:84% Maybe, it was now, the time I would join her. 00:41:13.170 --> 00:41:16.020 align:middle line:84% Grandmother, I called, and she smiled. 00:41:16.020 --> 00:41:19.050 align:middle line:84% Her face was now gray and lovely above the wind 00:41:19.050 --> 00:41:20.850 align:middle line:90% that snarled upriver. 00:41:20.850 --> 00:41:24.120 align:middle line:84% I saw the spirits eating from my feather edged dishes. 00:41:24.120 --> 00:41:25.980 align:middle line:90% I heard them in the wind. 00:41:25.980 --> 00:41:28.320 align:middle line:84% They put down their knives and forks. 00:41:28.320 --> 00:41:31.320 align:middle line:84% They came and held the sides of the tossing raft 00:41:31.320 --> 00:41:36.150 align:middle line:84% as we stepped onto it, some of us falling, others crying out. 00:41:36.150 --> 00:41:38.820 align:middle line:84% The spirits wore bright tunics and turbans, 00:41:38.820 --> 00:41:42.480 align:middle line:84% and I couldn't see beyond them as we crossed the river. 00:41:42.480 --> 00:41:46.170 align:middle line:84% They held the raft steady through the large pieces of ice. 00:41:46.170 --> 00:41:49.530 align:middle line:84% I spooned more cornbread to them, more squirrel meat, 00:41:49.530 --> 00:41:51.030 align:middle line:90% and peach cobbler. 00:41:51.030 --> 00:41:53.730 align:middle line:84% I had cooked it just this morning in my dream. 00:41:53.730 --> 00:41:56.970 align:middle line:84% Hold on, hold on, I heard them say. 00:41:56.970 --> 00:42:00.870 align:middle line:84% We tottered across the river, their ghost voices laughing 00:42:00.870 --> 00:42:02.175 align:middle line:90% to the freezing wind." 00:42:02.175 --> 00:42:05.930 align:middle line:90% 00:42:05.930 --> 00:42:07.640 align:middle line:84% Well, they finally make it to Oklahoma. 00:42:07.640 --> 00:42:10.700 align:middle line:84% Approximately 11,000 started out that fall, 00:42:10.700 --> 00:42:13.460 align:middle line:84% and a fourth of them died along the way. 00:42:13.460 --> 00:42:16.350 align:middle line:84% I think it's a very important part of American history, 00:42:16.350 --> 00:42:19.550 align:middle line:84% and so I was glad to be able to think what it must have 00:42:19.550 --> 00:42:21.725 align:middle line:90% been like to make that walk. 00:42:21.725 --> 00:42:30.900 align:middle line:90% 00:42:30.900 --> 00:42:36.110 align:middle line:84% Maybe one more, and that will be it. 00:42:36.110 --> 00:42:38.900 align:middle line:84% This book is called Firesticks, and of course, the fire 00:42:38.900 --> 00:42:41.780 align:middle line:84% sticks used to be the sticks that you lit the campfire with. 00:42:41.780 --> 00:42:45.120 align:middle line:84% And in this day, fire sticks are words. 00:42:45.120 --> 00:42:48.500 align:middle line:84% There was a time that was magic when what you spoke actually 00:42:48.500 --> 00:42:49.280 align:middle line:90% happened. 00:42:49.280 --> 00:42:51.800 align:middle line:84% That's why you have to be very careful with your words 00:42:51.800 --> 00:42:54.680 align:middle line:90% because words carry power. 00:42:54.680 --> 00:42:55.970 align:middle line:90% They create. 00:42:55.970 --> 00:42:59.660 align:middle line:84% When you speak, you make the trail on which you have to walk, 00:42:59.660 --> 00:43:02.480 align:middle line:84% and this is the tiny little excerpt that explains all that. 00:43:02.480 --> 00:43:05.420 align:middle line:84% In Firesticks, the main character has had a dream 00:43:05.420 --> 00:43:09.530 align:middle line:84% and she says, "the man spoke, and I saw the words come out 00:43:09.530 --> 00:43:10.520 align:middle line:90% of his mouth. 00:43:10.520 --> 00:43:13.610 align:middle line:84% Only the words were shaped like what they spoke. 00:43:13.610 --> 00:43:17.280 align:middle line:84% When he said tree, I saw a tree between his teeth. 00:43:17.280 --> 00:43:21.440 align:middle line:84% He said grass, and I saw the grass tumble off his tongue. 00:43:21.440 --> 00:43:24.410 align:middle line:84% He said sky, and the sky flew from his lips 00:43:24.410 --> 00:43:26.870 align:middle line:84% and attached itself to the clouds. 00:43:26.870 --> 00:43:30.830 align:middle line:84% He said house, and I saw the four walls stand up. 00:43:30.830 --> 00:43:31.910 align:middle line:90% Who is it? 00:43:31.910 --> 00:43:34.370 align:middle line:90% I don't know, hope I guess. 00:43:34.370 --> 00:43:36.290 align:middle line:90% I always felt I had nothing. 00:43:36.290 --> 00:43:39.710 align:middle line:84% Maybe, it's myself speaking something into existence. 00:43:39.710 --> 00:43:42.560 align:middle line:84% Maybe, words are not always separators. 00:43:42.560 --> 00:43:45.020 align:middle line:90% If I speak light, I have light. 00:43:45.020 --> 00:43:48.530 align:middle line:90% My words are fire sticks." 00:43:48.530 --> 00:43:50.148 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:43:50.148 --> 00:43:52.543 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:43:52.543 --> 00:44:00.220 align:middle line:90% 00:44:00.220 --> 00:44:01.120 align:middle line:90% Any questions? 00:44:01.120 --> 00:44:05.013 align:middle line:90% 00:44:05.013 --> 00:44:06.180 align:middle line:90% You've been a good audience. 00:44:06.180 --> 00:44:08.000 align:middle line:90% Thank you.