Cultural Exchange

4/26-4/27/07

Sun of dawn
slowly rising
muted red hanging low

Gray sky now above me
misty haze
the distant city

Leaving the city
closed in sky
turn around again

Turn around
leaving
turn around

Sunrise and I’m not sleeping
eyes half closed
silent ringing

The houses thin






Graced by the empty sky
stopped dead and rocking
but a rider-less horse on the horizon
won’t fade away

Big sky but grayed and storming
call the rain down
stuck by slowly turning
we lost our way

Sagebrush blue
spreading out on each side
of the road
Indian land beside the road

Billboards can’t advertise death
as effectively
as the high
the quiet desperation, though dignity

The white cross
tilts and turns
face toward the sky
blind and empty

The fence breaks
we back up apprehensive
watch the line
distant haze

The dirty water cloud break
clouds weaving
white on blue
black on red

The milkshake cold inside me
evoke geysers
Thermopolis
cheap cars

I hold my hand
in the shadowy reflection of a hand
as the bus turns
through the fence-line horizon






Wyoming’s muted colors
yet it’s spring
distant mountains crowned in white
crowned in clouds

I know the name
nameless river

The fence is charred
burned and black
field empty
crossed with flame

The tortured turret rock falls
nameless

A river has a neck
serpentine it curves
the hay bale retreat just before the storm
the line is drawn

I know the name
nameless

Of the horses
ride at dawn
sown to the water
spotted flanks

The rain comes in patterned prints
nameless

I know the name
nameless







1492
first contact
abolish discoveries
the survivors
huddles in starving comfort

He closed his eyes
squinting
sleepless
reading the tattered pages
of blue-jean history

Take off the red mask
and we’re just like you

1864
it’s just the same
I’ve walked a thousand miles
to leave my footprints in your heart

Wet feet on the concrete
the blue-green steam
on the window
writes a name







The buffalo behind me
stomped , sweated as he breathed
the dust must of life
his face a mask of mud, dried leaves

So, so long
I’ve dreamt of stars
ago
the time does slip unending
the translucent green stream of earth melting


My father’s name was Eagle
I tore my heart
my grandmother’s had soft and brittle
Chico

But I could ride
along vast steps
of dung and learn
the merit of unnamed time

I’m used to rising with the sun
though I opened my eyes to darkness
though I felt with my hand darkness
boundless sleep

So, so long ago
the buffalo seethed
his muddy hide steamed
the green weight

And I shot him, I caught him
right below the beating neck
stone doesn’t dull
the weightless stone falls

Redman speaks to God
the playing evening
Redman speaks to the herd
gathering wheel

The hair on my neck stood up behind me
they huddled in
horns black as night
I’ve held the night

Breath steaming
eyes streaming and cold
I thought they would press in
catch my fleshy skin

The buffalo behind me
is plastic
the skull is on display
my voice just fades






The static disembodied voice
speaking forgotten words
in a language
known by few

The old woman’s tongue
tore a picture from the scaly
shields painted brightly
black and white and red

Two flags beat back the breeze
I’ve read the scrolling letters
electric marquee
Welcome anyway

An empty cradleboard
foreign pattern ladybird
lying idly on the pot-marked wooden
table

Vacant spaces in the fabric
sown
unfeminine arms
cannot close

It’s all too photographed anyway
ignore the wide and open arms
the fry bread dipped in chokecherries not too sweat
the plaque is on display

Reinforced windows kept too clean
this wide and open boundary
horses left to graze
he rose and grasped the reins

Excited by the strange white faces
dreaming of paved-over places
she danced across the walls
singing like rain

The steady familiar beat
beating lyric poetry
their voices blend, raw to me
the steps too simply thin






The wolf-dog bounds
undulating though the fence
the sage, the crowd

Barbed-wire an inconvenience
a boundary to play
the red house on the hill at a distance
riding bare-back though the sky

The wolf-dog is silent
though he smiles wild calm
though he must be traveling

She wears her long black hair
done up and jeweled
with the dew
princess façade

She turns the baby over
voice is calm, hold the rope
leading on and on, the fence fades away

The table set with delicate care
I thought we’d set the terms
Giving pouches, busts like dead man’s urns
Catching dreams just for you

The wolf-dog howls only when he’s on you
sitting by the barred barricade
the square-eyed goats bleating, the sun

Passes through the screen
sharpening
horns grown too dull
in waiting

The wolf-dog sits, tail waving
by the Mary, mother shrine
blowers folded on the white marble polished bright

He has no use for the other dog, anyway
he’s just a passer-by
he watches me when I eat
without a name

He watches the strangers smile
pack and leaving
waving tails and teeth and paws

Cross over the river
the bridge of oak and steel
cross over the threshold
the house of photographs and rusted guns






We passed through St. Stephens
a fragrant breeze
the trophy halls
the lacquered window sills
and into the afternoon

This delicate April
this leafless spring
the weary steaming road
and on
sleep deprived and dehydrated

Home is swaying blossoms
lilac and the early waking trees
enough of Wyoming
its earthy hillsides
distant snow

I’m worn out
eye heavyred-eyed
though stretching between the seats
sleeping in idleness

They told us not to flaunt luxury
riding in a chartered bus
though I find more luxury
in the meadowlark bare-branched trees
the unfenced skyline

He said it was an adventure
warrior bust cradled in his arms
we crossed into Colorado
his voice magnified
distorted electronically

I gazed at the window
seeking the fallen council tree
in the manicured green
and found instead the merging of two rivers
water with water, sun with sun





his voice sounded like mud and rain

April Evening

Outside on an April evening
watching the listless trees
listening past the rusty gates
nestled in budding leaves

Past the squabbling sparrows
—the finch sings just for now
past here, in an enclosed space
my six foot shelter

The roads, a silent roar
the cars disembodied
I can’t see the pale faces
Pale because it’s April

Hearing between distant chords of thought
the common unconscious
of the wind
only a breeze now, only

A cold crisp April evening
when lilacs sniff the breeze
that common calling
—just for now

So long the empty,
the tied-down and sheltered vessel
the subtle change in season
Winter a vessel, empty

Silent roar
uncomprehending blindness
flick a switch—flick a wrist
and the glass is opaque

My glasses turn opaque at morning,
darker in the afternoon,
by evening they are fading
the sunset, just for now.

Lodge Poles

Sunlight and grainy dust
sepia
lodge poles in the trees
waved an old man down
standing still
willow twig between fingers
grainy and dry
slowly up and down
his tired gait
and why always so
beat down
the gravel road?
washboard and rising rust
the fence posts burned
and black
wind-licked flames

Running
hip-swinging
shoulder low
John Deer hat
sun-soaked beet field
running into the road
long, long road
river of black and white
yellow paint spattered on dry crosses
cross themselves
and rocks from winter beet fields

Limping
into the haze
the thinning veiled horizon
toward wind-blown flames
and off the roadside
in soft, budding, brittle grass
a cement drum tossed tipsily aside
flaked yellow paint
flowers in the green
rests open-mouthed, gaping
toward the long thin road
the ribbon of melted dissonance.