Clay Pots and Bones (4 page)

For J. E. M.

A sunset passes silently

as one more day's designs

are met and silenced.

Your whispering breath

colours the still night.

Your love of yarns

paints your dreams.

Hands held subliminally

close to a dispensing heart,

known so well by me.

Inseparable like a thorn

and a rose.

Eyes of a summer sky

and mine of earth,

so much left to uncover.

Standing as one we see

our labour blossom

into the best of me

and the best of you.

Together we'll watch

till we become part

of the landscape.

Raindrops slide freely across

my darkened face.

Clan brothers lie still, waiting

for my song of death,

ready deep inside my throat.

I Scream the Cry

I Scream the Cry

Raindrops slide freely across

my darkened face.

Clan brothers lie still waiting

for my song of death,

ready, deep inside my throat.

Silhouettes frozen,

the tools of death at rest for now,

charcoaled forest floor littered

with pine needles sticking to

leather and skin.

The enemy sleeps, all but one

tending fires, slowly

smoking meat for travel.

Forays into other sleeping camps

like ours, innocents

taken as they sleep.

Water fails to quench my need

for vengeance.

My knife feels heavy

as I scream the cry.

No Match for Steel

A loam-filled spade

covers the poxed constant face,

the high cheekbones,

until dust.

A bow with broken sinew

laid quiet, no match for steel,

alongside a quiver half

empty.

Drum beating slower for the dead.

whispering feet, light of night,

death rattles, all joining

a chorus.

Birch bark canoes with pitch

cracking under a sun

aided by a wind heavy

with sorrow.

An empty lodge of mud, sticks,

and water, ripped open by a

surgeon, turned butcher.

Flattened grass springing to life,

moccasined feet caressing

seasoned paths strewn with barren

pots of clay.

Scent of sweetgrass gliding out,

fields almost bare now

receding toward

the sea.

Songs lie forgotten on sand, gentle

breezes scatter unspoken

lyrics, unplayed melodies.

A quiet moment.

A scream of life echoes within

a new wi'kuom, bouncing off the faces

of skin and granite, dispersing to a

forest reborn.

In 1996 the poem “No Match for Steel” was the winner of the Anne Marie Campbell Award for Creative Writing, an award given annually by the University College of Cape Breton to promising Cape Breton writers.

In choosing “No Match for Steel” the judge for the competition, Beatrice MacNeil, explained her choice as follows:

It pierces an arrow into the heart of yesterday and mourns the loss of a way of life so eloquently that one can hear the “whispering feet” and the “wind heavy with sorrow.”

This writing is clear and haunting. It clears its throat of steel and screams for the scent of Sweetgrass to sweeten yesterday's lyrics. But the poet never loses completely. He is the moderator between time was and time is. His voice is the seed growing in the new forest. And the wind drifting softly by will wait and carry his words forever.

Welamsitew

A pool of mountain-clear water

captures trees with gnarled

branches somewhat like an old

one with many winters. The sky lies quiet,

clouds and blue,

trapped in the little pool.

An insect dances, six legs causing

tiny ripples dying off before

reaching shore at the face of

Welamsitew, the vain one, who

sits and gazes at her mirrored self.

Cheekbones as high as the tops of

maples, last year's garments

lying, carpet-like, the colour of

sweat lodge flames bathing rocks.

A brown squirrel chats without

pause, disturbing no one except

Welamsitew, the vain one, and

causes her to lose her

loving gaze.

Viewing again, she closes her

eyes and opens them a

butterfly's wing depth at a time,

slowly and carefully until brown

eyes see a brown face, an

old friend, familiar lover,

herself.

The world of Welamsitew returns

to normal, clouds move on,

the sky begins to darken, waves

wash ashore erasing the walking

portrait of Welamsitew,

the vain one.

For Ball and Shot

The winter rain never stops,

my feet are cold and I keep

longing for the warmth of

wi'kuom and my fire.

How I feel for the beaver,

his home at the tail of

this familiar lake.

Soon I will break open

his lodge of mud and stick

taking his young, his mate,

so that I may trade his life

and the lives of his clan

for ball and shot.

The bow pales beside the

musket balls and shot.

Once, a hunt would be silent,

with dignity, with acceptance,

now with great noise and

ceremony as a blazing tongue

bellows smoke and fire.

The cold wind swarms

over my clothed form.

Furs are gone,

traded for drink,

for ball and shot.

Lungs use less and less

of the morning air,

phlegm loosened

as I spray the slushy

grey snow, colouring it

like a summer sunset,

and then I hear a tail

slapping the once

familiar winter lake.

Mainkewin?
(Are You Going to Maine?)

Do you remember Maine?

Do you remember telling everyone who would listen that you were going to Vacation Land picking blueberries?

Do you remember the taste of your first submarine washed down with a cool Bud from the first store you saw after you crossed the border?

Do you remember the cool mornings that enabled you to get fifty plus boxes that first day at work there in the barrens?

Do you remember where you went swimming to cool off in afternoons? Was it Scoodic Lake or Columbia Falls?

Do you remember going back to the camp after picking blueberries and seeing the filth on your body?

Do you remember waking up the next day and being unable to move without pain?

Do you remember working in the hot August sun not worrying about the UV index?

Do you remember being up half the night treating your badly burned red back and asking yourself, “What am I doing here?”

Do you remember the excitement of getting your first pay and spending it in Cherryfield, Millbridge or Ellsworth?

Do you remember the Bay Rum Pirates, Canned Heat Gang behind Grant's General Store?

Do you remember staying until the frost killed the best berries of the season, the ones that were

promised to you by the leaseholder?

Do you remember hurrying to get home so the kids could go to school?

Do you remember the trip home and someone asking at the border, “All Indians?”

Shadows Dancing on the Edge

Photographs to petroglyph images,

beaded bone belts to fleeting

glimpses on sand swept clean

by wind and waves from distant

shores across the water of salt.

Stories so old, told around fire

pits as ancient as time.

Easy smiles seen in the dark

with shadows dancing on the

edge of the circle of light.

Knees pressed tightly to the

chest decorated with shells

white as the first snow, amulets

warding off spirits unkind to

the people who walk the woods.

Grandmother moon lends

her brilliance, illuminating the

questions that arise like mist in

the fields of sweetgrass near the shore.

When the morning sun touches

the tallest blade of swi-tey,

its mystic scent is dispersed

to far off places by the gentlest breeze,

No answers, just sensations

felt by those who are one

with their world.