WEBVTT

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Thank you.

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Pōmaikaʻi, I hope your
dad wouldn't take offense

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to the crack about the Gideons.

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I didn't mean
anything about that.

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We have our next writer, our
next poet, Ana W. Miigwan.

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She is an Ojibwe poet enrolled
in the Keweenaw Bay Indian

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Community.

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Her poems have appeared in
Chapter House and Liminal

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Spaces.

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Please welcome Ana.

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[APPLAUSE]

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If Christopher is Beyonce, then
I think Pōmaikaʻi is Rihanna.

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Chi-miigwech.

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This first poem I wrote,
it comes from a memory

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of when I was growing up.

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My brother, he was born
with cerebral palsy.

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And so his muscles--

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you don't have the
control-- he's not

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verbal and stuff like that.

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So when we were
growing up he had

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to get some of
his teeth removed.

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They told my parents that
they would be taking four

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and without their consent,
they ended up taking 12.

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So this is his poem.

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A Myth About My Brother.

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For Carter.

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I'm feeding the wolf
jammy strawberries

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when a windigo stalks
into the den wearing

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the skin of the medicine man.

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I ask if it is here
for the wolf's teeth.

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Maybe it keeps roots
or bark in its bag.

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It takes the spoon from my
hand, peels back the wolf's lips

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and yanks until all I see
is a beam of red moon.

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When it smiles, it has
a new set all its own.

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Stolen, mismatched, bloody,
brittle, no longer bone.

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[APPLAUSE]

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