anna wauneka comes to my hogan         --Norman H. Russell
anna wauneka comes to my hogan she tells me mother must go back to the hospital who has the whiteman's disease i say to anna we must ask my mother my mother says no I say to anna then she will not go anna says that then she will die then I tell anna wauneka that i think my mother will die anyway in the white man's hospital that it is better for her to die here than in that other house of the dead when my mother dies we will close the hogan we will build another hogan we will sing a song to my mother this will not be for a long time yet until that time comes I will dress my old mother each morning I will carry her into the new sunshine so that she will see the dawn come so that she will hear the bird sing.
from the journal Midwest Quarterly, 1970 (reprinted in From the Belly of the Shark, 1973)

I'm Not Going to Get Burned Out         --Ed Edmo
I'm not going to get burnt out with your amphetamines even though my People's lodges were burnt by U.S. Cavalry and "well-meaning" citizens I will not be flooded out by YOUR cheap wine stale beer and strong whiskey even though backwaters of dams cover our once sacred and promised grounds I will not be pacified by blue eyes and blond hair even though YOUR "heroic" mountain men raped my great-grandmother
from the anthology From the Belly of the Shark, ed. Lowenfels, 1973

Thief         --Tom WhiteCloud
We knew of war For we were warriors The winner takes all We knew of lies For we were diplomats in a small way. We knew of politics, for we were democrats: a man was a man. You took the land We tried to understand; You live on it, not with it. But, my friends, (And you were often good friends As you understood friendship): Why did you steal the smiles From our children?
from the journal Akwesasne Notes, 1971 (reprinted in From the Belly of the Shark, 1973)

The Delight Song of Tsoai-Talee         --N. Scott Momaday
I am a feather on the bright sky I am the blue horse that runs in the plain I am the fish that rolls, shining, in the water I am the shadow that follows a child I am the evening light, the lustre of meadows I am an eagle playing with the wind I am a cluster of bright beads I am the farthest star I am the cold of the dawn I am the roaring of the rain I am the glitter on the crust of the snow I am the long track of the moon in a lake I am a flame of four colors I am a deer standing away in the dusk I am a field of sumac and pomme blanche I am an angle of geese in the winter sky I am the hunger of a young wolf I am the whole dream of these things You see, I am alive, I am alive I stand in good relation to the earth I stand in good relation to the gods I stand in good relation to everything that is beautiful I stand in good relation to the daughter of Tsen-tainte You see, I am alive, I am alive
from Angle of Geese, 1974

The Time We Climbed Snake Mountain         --Leslie Marmon Silko
Seeing good places         for my hands I grab the warm parts of the cliff                 and I feel the mountain as I climb. Somewhere around here         yellow spotted snake is sleeping on his rock                 in the sun. So         please, I tell them                 watch out, don't step on the spotted yellow snake                          he lives here. The mountain is his.
from Laguna Woman, 1974

Carriers of the Dream Wheel         --N. Scott Momaday
This is the Wheel of Dreams Which is carried on their voices, By means of which their voices turn And center upon being. It encircles the First World, This powerful wheel. They shape their songs upon the wheel And spin the names on the earth and sky, The aboriginal names. They are old men, or men Who are old in their voices, And they carry the wheel among the camps, Saying: Come, come, Let us tell the old stories, Let us sing the sacred songs.
from The Gourd Dancer, 1976

Four Poems for a Child Son         --Simon J. Ortiz
December 18, 1972 "WHAT'S YOUR INDIAN NAME?" It has to do with full moments of mountains, deserts, sun, gods, song, completeness. It has to do with stories, legends full of heroes and travelling. It has to do with rebirth and growing and being strong and seeing. You see it's like this (the movement): go to the water and gather the straight willow stems bring them home work carefully at forming them tie on the feathers paint them with the earth feed them and talk with them pray. You see, son, the eagle is a whole person the way it lives; it means it has to do with paying attention to where it is, not the center of the earth especially but part of it, one part among all parts, and that's only the beginning.   IT WAS THE THIRD DAY, JULY 12, 1971 Hitch-hiking on the way to Colorado, I heard your voice, "Look, Dad . . ."             A hawk sweeping its wings                     clear through the whole sky                     the blue                     the slow wind fresh with the smell of summer alfalfa at the foot of the Jemez Mountains. (You see, the gods come during the summer for four days amongst the people, bring gifts, bring hope and life, you can see them, I mean.) Waiting for my next ride, I sang,         Look, the plants with bells.         Look, the stones with voices.   YESTERDAY In the late afternoon, there was suddenly a noise of birds filling up everything. This morning in the newspaper, I read about starlings at the Air Force base. I guess they were but all I knew yesterday was that they filled up the trees, the utility wires, the sky, the world. That's all I know.   WHAT MY UNCLE TONY TOLD MY SISTER AND ME Respect your mother and father. Respect your brothers and sisters. Respect your uncles and aunts. Respect your land, the beginning. Respect what is taught you. Respect what you are named. Respect the gods. Respect yourself. Everything that is around you is part of you.
from Going for the Rain, 1976

from Long time ago         --Leslie Marmon Silko
Long time ago in the beginning there were no white people in this world there was nothing European. And this world might have gone on like that except for one thing: witchery. This world was already complete even without white people. There was everything including witchery. Then it happened. These witch people got together. [. . . .] They all got together for a contest the way people have basketball tournaments nowadays except this was a contest in dark things. [. . . .] Finally there was only one who hadn't shown off charms or powers. [. . . .] This one just told them to listen: "What I have is a story." At first they all laughed but this witch said Okay go ahead laugh if you want to but as I tell the story it will begin to happen. Set in motion now set in motion by our witchery to work for us. Caves across the ocean in caves of dark hills white skin people like the belly of a fish covered with hair. Then they grow away from the earth then they grow away from the sun then they grow away from the plants and animals. They see no life When they look they see only objects. The world is a dead thing for them the trees and rivers are not alive the mountains and stones are not alive. The deer and bear are objects They see no life. They fear They fear the world. They destroy what they fear. They fear themselves. [. . . .] They will kill the things they fear all the animals the people will starve. They will poison the water they will spin the water away and there will be drought the people will starve. They will fear what they find They will fear the people They kill what they fear. Entire villages will be wiped out They will slaughter whole tribes. Corpses for us Blood for us Killing killing killing killing. [. . . .] Stolen rivers and mountains the stolen land will eat their hearts and jerk their mouths from the Mother. The people will starve. [. . . .] They will take this world from ocean to ocean they will turn on each other they will destroy each other Up here in these hills they will find the rocks, rocks with veins of green and yellow and black. They will lay the final pattern with these rocks they will lay it across the world and explode everything. [. . . .] So the other witches said "Okay you win; you take the prize, but what you said just now– [. . . .] Take it back. Call that story back." But the witch just shook its head at the others in their stinking animal skins, fur and feathers. It's already turned loose. It's already coming. It can't be called back.
from Storyteller, 1981

Columbus Day         --Jimmie Durham
In school I was taught the names Columbus, Cortez, and Pizzaro and A dozen other filthy murderers. A bloodline all the way to General Miles, Daniel Boone and general Eisenhower. No one mentioned the names Of even a few of the victims. But don't you remember Chaske, whose spine Was crushed so quickly by Mr. Pizzaro's boot? What words did he cry into the dust? What was the familiar name Of that young girl who danced so gracefully That everyone in the village sang with her– Before Cortez' sword hacked off her arms As she protested the burning of her sweetheart? That young man's name was Many Deeds, And he had been a leader of a band of fighters Called the Redstick Hummingbirds, who slowed The march of Cortez' army with only a few Spears and stones which now lay still In the mountains and remember. Greenrock Woman was the name Of that old lady who walked right up And spat in Columbus' face. We Must remember that, and remember Laughing Otter the Taino who tried to stop Columbus and who was taken away as a slave. We never saw him again. In school I learned of heroic discoveries Made by liars and crooks. The courage Of millions of sweet and true people Was not commemorated. Let us then declare a holiday For ourselves, and make a parade that begins With Columbus' victims and continues Even to our grandchildren who will be named In their honor. Because isn't it true that even the summer Grass here in this land whispers those names, And every creek has accepted the responsibility Of singing those names? And nothing can stop The wind from howling those names around The corners of the school. Why else would the birds sing So much sweeter here than in other lands?
from Columbus Day, 1983

I Give You Back         --Joy Harjo
I release you, my beautiful and terrible fear. I release you. You were my beloved and hated twin, but now, I don't know you as myself. I release you with all the pain I would know at the death of my daughters. You are not my blood anymore. I give you back to the white soldiers who burned down my home, beheaded my children, raped and sodomized my brothers and sisters. I give you back to those who stole the food from our plates when we were starving. I release you, fear, because you hold these scenes in front of me and I was born with eyes that can never close. I release you, fear, so you can no longer keep me naked and frozen in the winter, or smothered under blankets in the summer. I release you I release you I release you I release you I am not afraid to be angry. I am not afraid to rejoice. I am not afraid to be black. I am not afraid to be white. I am not afraid to be hungry. I am not afraid to be full. I am not afraid to be hated. I am not afraid to be loved. to be loved, to be loved, fear. Oh, you have choked me, but I gave you the leash. You have gutted me but I gave you the knife. You have devoured me, but I laid myself across the fire. You held my mother down and raped her, but I gave you the heated thing. I take myself back, fear. You are not my shadow any longer. I won't hold you in my hands. You can't live in my eyes, my ears, my voice my belly, or in my heart my heart my heart my heart But come here, fear I am alive and you are so afraid                              of dying.
from She Had Some Horses, 1983

She Had Some Horses         --Joy Harjo
She had some horses. She had horses who were bodies of sand. She had horses who were maps drawn of blood. She had horses who were skins of ocean water. She had horses who were the blue air of sky. She had horses who were fur and teeth. She had horses who were clay and would break. She had horses who were splintered red cliff. She had some horses. She had horses with eyes of trains. She had horses with full, brown thighs. She had horses who laughed too much. She had horses who threw rocks at glass houses. She had horses who licked razor blades. She had some horses. She had horses who danced in their mothers' arms. She had horses who thought they were the sun and their bodies shone and burned like stars. She had horses who waltzed nightly on the moon. She had horses who were much too shy, and kept quiet in stalls of their own making. She had some horses. She had horses who liked Creek Stomp Dance songs. She had horses who cried in their beer. She had horses who spit at male queens who made them afraid of themselves. She had horses who said they weren't afraid. She had horses who lied. She had horses who told the truth, who were stripped bare of their tongues. She had some horses. She had horses who called themselves, horse. She had horses who called themselves, spirit, and kept their voices secret and to themselves. She had horses who had no names. She had horses who had books of names. She had some horses. She had horses who whispered in the dark, who were afraid to speak. She had horses who screamed out of fear of the silence, who carried knives to protect themselves from ghosts. She had horses who waited for destruction. She had horses who waited for resurrection. She had some horses. She had horses who got down on their knees for any savior. She had horses who thought their high price had saved them. She had horses who tried to save her, who climbed in her bed at night and prayed as they raped her. She had some horses. She had some horses she loved. She had some horses she hated. These were the same horses.
from She Had Some Horses, 1983

Missing the Animals         --Linda Hogan
Sick people are about to recapture                          wild beasts that broke out of their blood.                                                               Nellie Sachs So many have escaped space disappears. The planet fills up with loud gunshots killing death, a wingbeat going out an open hole in space. The air holds nothing like a silent cage, no roars, no scratchings, only our breath and a whale with air dry on it and initials people carved to leave themselves known to death. The animals are leaving and even gunshots fired down the edge of the world have missed them.
from Eclipse, 1983

Who Will Speak?         --Linda Hogan
If all the animals came from the hills, if all the fish came from the rivers, and the birds came down from the sky we would know our lives, small, somewhere between the mountain and the ant. We would see what we do pass by and return around earth's curve. All I know are these rivers, the air and wind carving down the trees with their invisible hands until the trees are bent figures of old men and then only the empty space, a longing that passes. And that sorrow says, the animals, who will speak for them? Who will make houses of air with their words? And the mouth of a man, the tongue that belongs to grass and light and the four-legged creatures. He speaks of tomorrow. He gives voice to the small animals. He gives a seat to the eagles. Words for the fish. The golden light of creation. Light. Lumine. The world returns. I do not want to break this spell. I do not want the words to fall away. I do not want to break this spell.                                 (for Oren Lyons, 1978)
from Eclipse, 1983 (Section V. of a poem-sequence of the same title)

Canticle         --Joseph Bruchac
Let others speak of harps and heavenly choirs I've made my decision to remain here with the Earth if the old grey poet felt he could turn and live with the animals why should I be too good to stay and die with them and the great road of the Milky Way that Sky Trail my Abenaki ancestors strode to the last Happy Home does not answer my dreams I do not believe we go up to the sky unless it is to fall again with the rain
from Near the Mountains, 1987

woodpecker song         --Lance Henson
i am making this sound upon the earth the curled leaf filled with water holds a looking glass of sky in a quiet place i make this small sound
from Another Song for America, 1987

Raven is Two-Faced         --Robert H. Davis
Raven eyes blink day/night        day/night . . . The world has its top and its underside and Raventracks lead every direction. You can tell he's been busy. Shifty. That he's got this game of intrigue down because definitely everything, He's made certain, is the opposite of something else. There's no way out of his two-sided setup; you can turn this poem inside out, trying to interpret its other meaning.
from Harper's Anthology of 20th Century Native American Poetry, ed. Niatum, 1988

My House Is the Red Earth         --Joy Harjo
My house is the red earth; it could be the center of the world. I've heard New York, Paris, or Tokyo called the center of the world, but I say it is magnificently humble. You could drive by and miss it. Radio waves can obscure it. Words cannot construct it, for there are some sounds left to sacred wordless form. For instance, that fool crow, picking through trash near the corral, understands the center of the world as greasy scraps of fat. Just ask him. He doesn't have to say that the earth has turned scarlet through fierce belief, after centuries of heartbreak and laughter–he perches on the blue bowl of the sky, and laughs. If you look with the mind of the swirling earth near Shiprock you become the land, beautiful. And understand how three crows at the edge of the highway, laughing, become three crows at the edge of the world, laughing. Don't bother the earth spirit who lives here. She is working on a story. It is the oldest story in the world and it is delicate, changing. If she sees you watching she will invite you in for coffee, give you warm bread, and you will be obligated to stay and listen. But this is no ordinary story. You will have to endure earthquakes, lightning, the deaths of all those you love, the most blinding beauty. It's a story so compelling you may never want to leave; this is how she traps you. See that stone finger over there? That is the only one who ever escaped.
(three untitled prose poems) from Secrets from the Center of the World, 1989; combined as one song lyric in Letter from the End of the Twentieth Century, 1997

Eagle Poem         --Joy Harjo
To pray you open your whole self To sky, to earth, to sun, to moon To one whole voice that is you. And know there is more That you can't see, can't hear, Can't know except in moments Steadily growing, and in languages That aren't always sound but other Circles of motion. Like eagle that Sunday morning Over Salt River. Circled in blue sky In wind, swept our hearts clean With sacred wings. We see you, see ourselves and know That we must take the utmost care And kindness in all things. Breathe in, knowing we are made of All this, and breathe, knowing We are truly blessed because we Were born, and die soon within a True circle of motion, Like eagle rounding out the morning Inside us. We pray that it will be done In beauty. In beauty.
from In Mad Love and War, 1990

For Anna Mae Pictou Aquash, Whose Spirit is Present Here and in the Dappled Stars (For We Remember the Story and Must Tell It Again So We May All Live)         --Joy Harjo
Beneath a sky blurred with mist and wind, I am amazed as I watch the violet heads of crocuses erupt from the stiff earth after dying for a season, as I have watched my own dark head appear each morning after entering the next world to come back to this one, amazed. It is the way in the natural world to understand the place the ghost dancers named after the heartbreaking destruction. Anna Mae, everything and nothing changes. You are the shimmering young woman who found her voice, when you were warned to be silent, or have your body cut away from you like an elegant weed. You are the one whose spirit is present in the dappled stars. (They prance and lope like colored horses who stay with us through the streets of these steely cities. And I have seen them nuzzling the frozen bodies of tattered drunks on the corner.) This morning when the last star is dimming and the busses grind toward the middle of the city, I know it is ten years since they buried you the second time in Lakota, a language that could free you. I heard about it in Oklahoma, or New Mexico, how the wind howled and pulled everything down in righteous anger. (It was the women who told me) and we understood wordlessly the ripe meaning of your murder. As I understand ten years later after the slow changing of the seasons that we have just begun to touch the dazzling whirlwind of our anger, we have just begun to perceive the amazed world the ghost dancers entered crazily, beautifully.
from In Mad Love and War, 1990

The Real Revolution Is Love         --Joy Harjo
I argue with Roberto from the slick-tiled patio where house plants as big as elms sway in a samba breeze at four or five in the Managua morning after too many yerbabuenas and as many shots of golden rum. And watch Pedro follow Diane up her brown arm, over the shoulder of her cool dress, the valleys of her neck to the place inside her ear where he isn't speaking revolution. And Alonzo tosses in the rhetoric made of too much rum and the burden of being an American in a country he no longer belongs to. What we are dealing with here are ideological differences, political power, he says to impress a woman who is gorgeously intelligent and who reminds me of the soft oasis of my lover's cheek. She doesn't believe anything but the language of damp earth beneath a banana tree at noon, and will soon disappear in the screen of rum, with a man who keeps his political secrets to himself in favor of love. I argue with Roberto, and laugh across the continent to Diane, who is on the other side of the flat, round table whose surface ships would fall off if they sailed to the other side. We are Anishnabe and Muscogee. We have wars of our own. Knowing this we laugh and laugh, until she disappears into the poinsettia forest with Pedro, who is still arriving from Puerto Rico. Palm trees flutter in smoldering tongues. I can look through the houses, the wind, and hear quick laughter become a train that has no name. Columbus doesn't leave the bow of the slippery ship. This is the land of revolution. You can do anything you want, Roberto tries to persuade me. I fight my way through the cloud of rum and laughter, through lines of Spanish and spirits of the recently dead whose elbows rustle the palm leaves. It is almost dawn and we are still a long way from morning, but never far enough to get away. I do what I want, and take my revolution to bed with me, alone. And awake in a story told by my ancestors when they speak a version of the very beginning, of how so long ago we climbed the backbone of these tortuous Americas. I listen to the splash of the Atlantic and Pacific and see Columbus land once more, over and over again. This is not a foreign country, but the land of our dreams. I listen to the gunfire we cannot hear, and begin this journey with the light of knowing the root of my own furious love.
from In Mad Love and War, 1990

Snowy Owl Near Ocean Shores         --Duane Niatum
sits on a stump in an abandoned farmer's field, a castaway from an arctic tundra storm. Beyond the dunes cattails toss and bend as snappy as the surf, rushing and crashing down the jetty. His head glances round; his eyes, a deeper yellow than the winter sun, seem to spot a mouse crawl from a mud hole to bare grass-patch. When half an hour of wind and sleet passes and nothing darts, a North Pole creature shows us how to last. The wind ruffles his feathers from crown to claws while he continues gazes at the salt-slick rain. So when a double-rainbow arced the sky we left him to his white refrain.
from Drawings of the Song Animals, 1991

The Intellectual in Pine Ridge         --Adrian C. Louis
"It was dark and terrible all about me, for all the winds of the world were fighting."                                                               –Black Elk [According to John G. Neihardt] On the wagon again, Drinking diet Pepsi and potato chips, typing the channel selector I fly down Indianapolis Speedway at 220 miles per hour when I collide with an overgrown dentist's drill. I run screaming from his office but bees of hot lead kiss my body. I feel the sprinkle of molten spill from a foundry crucible. Facedown on a crack dealer's street I count the machine gun holes ventilating my soul. I stagger to my horse and gallop to the village to warn the people of charging cavalry but CNN has beat me there. I am wheeled into the operating room to watch a doctor and nurse shave each other's body hair. I have won a freezer and a chance at the mystery prize but first I must see which deodorant really works best. I push the off button and sit in the dark room waiting for Jesus. My mind is blank. I cannot think. My finger itches and touches the button. The tube comes on and I live again!
from Among the Dog Eaters, 1992

December 29, 1890         --N. Scott Momaday
Wounded Knee Creek In the shine of photographs are the slain, frozen and black on a simple field of snow. They image ceremony: women and children dancing, old men prancing, making fun. In autumn there were songs, long since muted in the blizzard. In summer the wild buckwheat shone like fox fur and quillwork, and dusk guttered on the creek. Now in serene attitudes of dance, the dead in glossy death are drawn in ancient light.
from In the Presence of the Sun, 1992

Nature Poem         --Sherman Alexie
If you're an Indian, why don't you write nature poetry? inside this bottle stands of pine burning Indian fire fighters black ash faces & 16 hour days caught in the middle ring of fire they dug a hole & burrowed in pretending to be roots or gophers, etc. hoping the fires would pass over like an (eagle) no one in the hole was burned fire sucked the air from their lungs buried in graves they dug for themselves
from Old Shirts & New Skins, 1993

Crow Law         --Linda Hogan
The temple where crow worships walks forward in tall, black grass. Betrayal is crow's way of saying grace to the wolf so it can eat what is left when blood is on the ground, until what remains of moose is crow walking out the sacred temple of ribs in a dance of leaving the red tracks of scarce and private gods. It is the oldest war where moose becomes wolf and crow, where the road ceases to become the old forest where crow is calling, where we are still afraid.
from The Book of Medicines, 1993

The Ritual Life of Animals         --Linda Hogan
The animal walks beside me, long-toothed partner in a sacrificial dance. It lies down on the land as I walk upright. It has come from the swampy beginnings of blood, lung, hand. Killing is the prayer before its every meal. And in the dark nocturnal waking, there's the falling to all fours, a wild seeing, other ears hearing. After breathing and clawing, is the solemn rite of sleep that crosses into dream, that holds council with foreign tongues and common hungers. In the sleeping bird, the dream is flying south. The male is the dance before the female, and there is fear; I am the enemy dreamed in the restless sleep of a whale, bird, those who possess the desperate gifts of feigning death, running, turning the color of snow. In the silence of night, in the warmth of human bodies, are the nocturnal wakings. Something inside gets down on its haunches. At the borders of our beds are the strange ways, voices, the slow shifting of eyes, turning of ears. They hear us, smell us, dream us. We lie down in the long nights of their waking, the world of animal law, the house of pelvic truth.
from The Book of Medicines, 1993

Travelers         --Linda Hogan
The terrible cold is a closing hand. It takes back the edges of land and water it once offered. It is alive, you mustn't doubt this, and it holds danger in its fist. It says a mirage is a city of warmth, but when you go there it is always beyond the next white horizon that can never be possessed. I was looking at that far city the night snow lied about the darker world beneath it, that brittle night it grew cold so fast the geese froze into water and couldn't fly. Their fear cried out across the helpless land, and when I heard them I was the hand of death gone soft enough to hit the solid skin of water with stick, with rock, with fear that what held them held me. South was their way that night. They wanted to follow it. Even my human ears heard its blue voice in the stretched and beating wings, as I cut one leg loose, then another, until breaking gave way to currents above and below that drew them. They pushed against the broken edges of water, long-necked angels that rose, escaping me and ice and sky took them in beyond the curved edge of horizon where one beautiful world moved above another skimming the flat white lake, the wounded ice left behind to heal itself.
from The Book of Medicines, 1993

The Myth of Blackbirds         --Joy Harjo
The hours we counted precious were blackbirds in the density of Washington. Taxis toured the labyrinth with passengers of mist as the myth of ancient love took the shape of two figures carrying the dawn tenderly on their shoulders to the shores of the Potomac. We fled the drama of lit marble in the capitol for a refuge held up by sweet, everlasting earth. The man from Ghana who wheeled our bags was lonesome for his homeland, but commerce made it necessary to carry someone else's burdens. The stars told me how to find us in this disorder of systems. Washington did not ever sleep that night in the sequence of eternal nights. There were whirring calculators, computers stealing names, while spirits of the disappeared drank coffee at an all-night cafˇ in this city of disturbed relativity. Justice is a story by heart in the beloved country where imagination weeps. The sacred mountains only appear to be asleep. When we finally found the room in the hall of mirrors and shut the door I could no longer bear the beauty of scarlet licked with yellow on the wings of blackbirds. This is the world in which we undressed together. Within it white deer intersect with the wisdom of the hunter of grace. Horses wheel toward the morning star. Memory was always more than paper and cannot be broken by violent history or stolen by thieves of childhood. We cannot be separated in the loop of mystery between blackbirds and the memory of blackbirds. And in the predawn when we had slept for centuries in a drenching sweet rain you touched me and the springs of clear water beneath my skin were new knowledge. And I loved you in this city of death. Through the darkness in the sheer rise of clipped green grass and asphalt our ancestors appear together at the shoreline of the Potomac in their moccasins and pressed suits of discreet armor. They go to the water from the cars of smokey trains, or dismount from horses dusty with fatigue. See the children who become our grandparents, the old women whose bones fertilized the corn. They form us in our sleep of exhaustion as we make our way through this world of skewed justice, of songs without singers. I embrace these spirits of relatives who always return to the place of beauty, whatever the outcome in the spiral of power. And I particularly admire the tender construction of your spine which in the gentle dawning is a ladder between the deep in which stars are perfectly stars, and the heavens where we converse with eagles. And I am thankful to the brutal city for the space which outlines your limber beauty. To the man from Ghana who also loves the poetry of the stars. To the ancestors who do not forget us in the concrete and paper illusion. To the blackbirds who are exactly blackbirds. And to you sweetheart as we make our incredible journey.
from The Woman Who Fell from the Sky, 1994

Promise         --Joy Harjo
The guardians of dusk blow fire from the Rincons as clouds confer over the Catalinas in the fading tracks of humans. I interpret the blur of red as female rain tomorrow, or the child born with the blessings of animals who will always protect her. I am always amazed at the skill of rain clouds who outline the weave of human destiny [density in original]. Crickets memorize the chance event with rainsongs they have practiced for centuries. I am recreated by that language. Their predictions are always true. And as beautiful as saguaro flowers drinking rain. I see the moon as I have never seen the moon, a half shell, just large enough for a cradleboard and the child who takes part in the dance of evolution as seen in the procession of tadpoles to humans painting the walls with wishes. From the moon we all look the same. In two days the girl will be born and nothing will ever look the same. I knew the monsoon clouds were talking about it as they softened the speed of light. You can manipulate words to turn departure into aperture, but you cannot figure the velocity of love and how it enters every equation. It's related to the calculation of the speed of light, and how light prevails. And then the evening star nods her head, nearby a lone jet ascending. I understand how light prevails. And when she was born it rained. Everything came true the way it was promised.
from The Woman Who Fell from the Sky, 1994

Prayer Animals         --Sherman Alexie
Do not try to convince me the United States is anything other than savannah. Weeds burst through the sidewalk. Drought washes the car windows, then wipes its face with the same dirty handkerchief. Secret meetings. The newspaper explains about the food chain. I am the gazelle in braids and powwow jeans. Sometime before sunset, I scan the horizon, then bend my head to the stream. The water is cold and clear. I have 355 degree vision. My only question: Will the hunter use the rifle or his teeth?
from The Summer of Black Widows, 1996

Mount Rushmore & The Arm of Crazy Horse         --Tiffany Midge
I remember the view. 4 carved faces fleshed out from the granite of those sacred hills. I don't remember knowing what I know now, only my childhood's awe & curious disbelief at the stone-white faces cut out from the horizon more massive than any god I could imagine. Trapped within another mountain, a warrior's arm pointed toward battle, exhibited a simpler truth, clearer than any white colonial freedom fighter could tell me. And when I think about it, without stepping on a soap box, without screaming at my conservative amway-loving friends, without purchasing dynamite or spray paint, that arm slowly sculpted into view, should have remained just an arm–attached to a hand pointed toward battle. Just an unfinished tribute to an unfinished war.
from Outlaws, Renegades and Saints: Diary of a Mixed-Up Halfbreed, 1996

Crow Testament         --Sherman Alexie
1. Cain lifts Crow, that heavy black bird and strikes down Abel. Damn, says Crow, I guess this is just the beginning.   2. The white man, disguised as a falcon, swoops in and yet again steals a salmon from Crow's talons. Damn, says Crow, if I could swim I would have fled this country years ago.   3. The Crow God as depicted in all of the reliable Crow bibles looks exactly like a Crow. Damn, says Crow, this makes it so much easier to worship myself.   4. Among the ashes of Jericho, Crow sacrifices his firstborn son. Damn, says Crow, a million nests are soaked with blood.   5. When Crows fight Crows the sky fills with beaks and talons. Damn, says Crow, it's raining feathers.   6. Crow flies around the reservation and collects empty beer bottles but they are so heavy he can only carry one at a time. So, one by one, he returns them but only gets five cents a bottle. Damn, says Crow, redemption is not easy.   7. Crow rides a pale horse into a crowded powwow but none of the Indians panic. Damn, says Crow, I guess they already live near the end of the world.
from One Stick Song, 2000

Soon to Be a National Geographic Special         --Sherman Alexie
All of the Indian boys in the world gathered into one red Toyota Celica or perhaps it was just Steve, Tom, and me though, truthfully speaking, it wasn't Tom at all. In fact, it was his brother Dan, but I want to place Tom in the Celica with Steve and me because Tom killed himself a few years back, and I miss him. I want to remember him in some poem, in this particular poem because I am a poet now, though I wasn't a poet back then. Of course Tom wasn't a poet and he wasn't an Indian either, which means his brother wasn't Indian, and Steve was only a little bit Indian himself, but he grew up on the reservation, and therefore was a full Indian pretty much by osmosis. So, now, to reiterate, the Toyota was filled with all of the Indian boys in the world (meaning there was one white boy who was only there metaphorically, one mostly-white boy made Indian by association, and one true and actual Indian boy) as the auto sped through the reservation night, as it insulted the cold air with the heat of its arrival and passage, as we Indian boys laughed at the impossibility of the Northern Lights, as the Great Barn Owl swooped down over the ditch, its epic wings stretching from ditch to ditch, its epic wings striking flames as it roared directly toward all of the Indian boys in the world, as Steve slammed on the brakes, or more likely, it was Tom who slammed on the brakes (meaning that his brother Dan slammed on the brakes) as that Great Barn Owl flew just a few feet above the pavement as it grew so large and impossible in the headlights, as all of the Indian boys in the world, in the Toyota Celica, decided they were going to die, die, die as that Great Barn Owl suddenly lifted into the air, just barely avoiding a terrible head-on collision, as the three of us ducked our heads in reflex, as we turned to look behind us, turned to look at our past, at our future, as we turned to see that Great Barn Owl disappear somewhere behind the poker-faced moon.
from One Stick Song, 2000

from The Unauthorized Biography of Me         --Sherman Alexie
[. . . .] Every time I venture into the bookstore, I find another book about Indians. There are hundreds of books about Indians published every year, yet so few are written by Indians. I gather all the books written about Indians. I discover: A book written by a person who identifies as mixed-blood will sell more copies than a book written by a person who identifies as strictly Indian. A book written by a non-Indian will sell more copies than a book written by either a mixed-blood or an Indian writer. [. . . .] A book about Indian life in the past, whether written by a non-Indian, mixed-blood, or Indian, will sell more copies than a book about Indian life in the twentieth century. If you are a non-Indian writing about Indians, it is almost guaranteed that something positive will be written about you by Tony Hillerman. [. . . .] Books about the Sioux sell more copies than all of the books written about other tribes combined. Mixed-blood writers often write about any tribe which interests them, whether or not they are related to that tribe. Writers who use obvious Indian names, such as Eagle Woman and Pretty Shield, are usually non-Indian. Non-Indian writers usually say "Great Spirit," "Mother Earth," "Two-Legged, Four-Legged, and Winged." Mixed-blood writers usually say "Creator," "Mother Earth," "Two-Legged, Four-Legged, and Winged." Indian writers usually say, "God," "Mother Earth," "Human Being, Dog, and Bird." If a book about Indians contains no dogs, then it was written by a non-Indian or mixed-blood writer. If on the cover of a book there are winged animals who aren't supposed to have wings, then it was written by a non-Indian. [. . . .]
from One Stick Song, 2000

humans aren't the only makers of poetry         --Joy Harjo
The young banana tree is making poetry; I see how it translates the wind. The need to make songs is inherent in all life. I've watched plants hungrily drink rainwater. They are grateful and are more likely to sing if it is rainwater they are receiving. If it's water from a hose, they will drink it with gratitude but as they drink they keep looking toward the sky. And will eventually sing to bring the rain if they suffer from drought. It's just not humans who sing for rain, make poetry as commentary on the meaning of life. We aren't the only creatures, or the most likely to survive.
from A Map to the Next World, 2000

from "Returning from the Enemy"         --Joy Harjo
The elegant white heron on Kualoa Beach enjoyed the light winds and the smell of fish as we all watched the falling sun with reverence. I did not see guilt in his posture, nor did I hear him admonish himself for some failure of the deep or near past, rather he absolutely enjoyed his heron-ness, the wind, the sun and made note of the approach of the longest night of the year. He had no doubt as to his right to be a heron, or his right to enjoy the catch and taste of fish. But what do I know of herons? I do not know their language or their culture. We have human observations. Though for any small creature or god in this universe it comes down to attitude. You can walk through hell with your head up, still sparring with the fire, or you can be defeated by any small thing.
from A Map to the Next World, 2000 (prose-poem "appendix" to section 11 of the poem)

wild turkey in massena, n.y.         --Maurice Kenny
(heard poem on WSLU-FM afternoon news     reported by Martha Foley 11/14/96) Found staggering the streets of this fair but chilly city, apparently consumed too much beverage in the form of wild cranberries freshly plucked in the bog, or some other tempting fruit fermenting.         The turkey was jailed. Presently is drying out. Will be released later.
from In the Time of the Present, 2000

Jehovah Calls In Sick Again         --Adrian C. Louis
The mad babble from down below is a pain in His holy ass. Most days He shuts His windows to the manic rain of prayers. In the silver-clouded wilderness of my imagined privacy, He contemplates His options. He could decide to dispatch flame-throwing angels to incinerate every American male who has had the slightest involvement with gangs. He could torment them again with a phalanx of angels disguised as little, bug-eyed aliens. He could grow hair on the breasts of every woman who has a tattoo. He could arrange for Jerry Falwell to be caught kissing a young boy. He could send blood floods, gut blizzards, terrible tornadoes to Indian reservations or schoolyard killers to Catholic schools, but today He thinks . . . He'll just doze for a while, maybe later traipse down to the dungeon He built for the shackled and starving Great Spirit.
from Bone & Juice, 2001

Avian Nights         --Sherman Alexie
Starlings have invaded our home and filled Our eaves with their shit-soaked nests. Rats with wings, They are scavengers we pay to have killed By the quick exterminator who sings In Spanish as he pulls three baby birds, Blind and mewling, from the crawlspace above Our son's bedroom. Without a word, the exterminator uses a thumb And finger to snap the birds' necks–crack, crack, Crack–then drops their bodies to the driveway Below. For these deaths, I write him a check. This is his job. He neither loves nor hates The starlings. They just need to be removed. Without guilt, the exterminator loads His truck with dead birds and the tattered ruins Of nests: twigs, string, newspapers. It is cold When he drives away and leaves us, mother And father of a sick son, to witness The return of the father and mother Starlings to their shared children, to their nest, All of it gone, missing, absent, destroyed. The starlings don't understand synonyms As they flutter and make this terrible noise: The screech-screech-screech of parental instinct, Of panic and loss. We had to do this, We rationalize. They woke up our son With their strange songs and the beating of wings Through the long, avian nights. Then, at dawn The babies screamed to greet the morning light. What could they've been so excited about? What is starling joy? When a starling finds A shiny button, does it dance and shout? Do starlings celebrate their day of birth? Do they lust and take each other to bed? Are they birds of infinite jest, of mirth And merry? How do they bury their dead? We will never know how this winged mother And father would have buried their children. Our son almost died at birth. His mother And I would have buried him in silence And blankets that smelled like us. These birds Don't believe in silence. They scream and wail. They attack the walls. We have never heard Such pain from any human. Without fail, The starlings mourn for three nights and three days. They fly away, only to carry back Insects like talismans, as if to say They could bring back the dead with bird magic, As if their hungry children could cheat death And suddenly appear with open mouths. At birth, our son suffocated, his breath Stolen as he swallowed his own shit. Faith In God at such a time seems like a huge joke. To save our son, the doctors piped the blood Out of his heart and lungs, then through his throat, Via sterile tube, via smooth cut Of his carotid, then sent his blood though The oxygen machine, before they pushed The red glow back into him. This was new Technology and he lived, though he crashed Twice that first night, and spent the next five weeks Flat on his back. His mother and I sat At his bedside eighteen hours a day. Screech- Screech-screech. We cawed and cawed to bring him back. We attacked the walls of the ICU With human wings. Screech-screech-screech. Grief can take The form of starlings, of birds who refuse To leave the dead. How much love, hope, and faith Do these birds possess? They lift their faces And scream to the Bird-God while we grow numb. The starlings are odd, filthy, and graceless, But if God gave them opposable thumbs, I'm positive they would open the doors Of our house and come for us as we sleep. We killed their children. We started this war. Tell me: What is the difference between Birds and us, between their pain and our pain? We build monuments; they rebuild their nests. They lay other eggs; we conceive again. Dumb birds, dumb women, dumb starlings, dumb men.
from the journal New Letters (2003)