That was great, Anthony.
That was great.
By the way, what was that?
[LAUGHTER]
Is that a military base?
Oh, yeah.
Is it?
I don't know.
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
I don't know anything about Phoenix.
Just kidding.
Tucson.
[LAUGHTER]
Just kidding.
Thank you, Anthony.
We have our next reader.
Elise Paschen.
She is an enrolled member of the Osage Nation.
She's the author of six poetry collections and most recently,
Blood Wolf Moon.
Her other books include Tallchief, The Nightlife,
Bestiary, Infidelities, winner of the Nicholas Roerich Poetry
Prize, and Houses Coasts.
As an undergraduate at Harvard, she received the Garrison Medal
for poetry.
She holds multiple degrees from Oxford University.
Paschen received the Rupert Costo Chair
in American Indian Affairs Medal in 2019.
Paschen teaches in the MFA Writing Program
at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Please welcome Elise.
[APPLAUSE]
Hawé.
Elise Paschen zha'-zhe a-brįe.
Hello, my name is Elise Paschen.
Let's give another round of applause
for our incredible Fellows.
[APPLAUSE]
It's always so inspiring to share
the podium with our Fellows each of our retreats.
So our mentoring retreat this year
has focused on sacred spaces.
I'll read four poems which circle around the sacred
from my most recent poetry collection, Blood Wolf Moon.
The book begins with a long poem called
Heritage, which takes a deep dive into my Osage story lines.
This poem is about our creation story.
Heritage two.
Extinguished.
Our next of kin descended from constellations.
The little ones desiring a form out of air
into muscle, sinew, limbs, landing in red oak trees
and with the heft of their new bodies, scattered
capped oak nuts across the Earth.
Underneath branches, each acorn a child to be born.
How eagle navigated the downward flight.
Wings spackled catching spirals of wind.
Waters blown across landmasses sculpted by great elk.
The Earth maker.
As hooves sunk, torso and antlers heaved into ocean.
The water people, the name givers
gave Appalachians to the sky people, the land people.
I have always been earthbound and obstinate,
drawn to these rising and falling hills, the tall grass
prairies, the deer rutting moon hovering over the ridge.
How I mapped the rental car onto back roads.
The trails my relatives crisscrossed on their seasonal
hunts until I was lost.
My Osage name descends from the Buffalo clan.
I seek out bodies of water the way
those who came before settled along the deep tributaries.
The veins on the backs of our hands.
Hands I recognize in those oval family portraits.
Long, lean, poised.
I was born in the month of the blood wolf moon.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you so much.