Living the Dream

He said he was going for a walk,
put on his snowshoes, headed up
green walled tunnel; head down,
arms swinging in a heavy parka,
feet leaving rabbit-foot thatching
in a straight and fading parallel
where perspective is so perfect.

She said he was wrong about cold
being a beautiful lover, knowing his freeze
and lip of lake ice on a glass
of beer.

If such as she was his mistress,
that desire that muddled his brain,
then she should have known
open arms would swallow him
one frozen appendage after another.

Tags: Beloved Be, Poems by Shewolf
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Grandmother, on a flat near the river,
heaved over in her Hudson Bay blanket,
and blinked at the granddaughter
gnawing on her fingernails:

“Sister,” she said, through the firelight,
“Nothing’s gunna bother with ya.
You have no meat on dem bones
and hyena’s couldn’t crack ya, yer so dry.

Sometimes ya gotta just flick off the blow flies,
not let ‘em lay their eggs, under that thin skin of yers.
Maggots make butterflies and they fly, them, then, free.
Don’t hate your mother so bad you kill her off in you.”

Yesterday’s bones had been slicked clean as ivory,
maggots had feasted on far-flung guts, and then left the picnic,
but there was dry meat hung over a good smoke.

Tags: Native Culture, Poems by Shewolf
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When I was little and pounding on black notes
because I liked the jar of it, I knew nothing of harmony
nor of wanting to play music for anyone special.

With nerves knotting at the upper edge
of my shoulder blades, I practiced scales.
Stretching little hands and long fingers chord to chord,
I found they fit a banging bravado needed
for “Mine Eyes Have Seen The Glory”.

“Amazing Grace” would not echo in the folds
of memory nor “Lord, Help Me Jesus”
and I hated the rote repetition needed
to pass the Provincial Music Exams.

In secret, I was listening to my own music
while my hands picked at flats and sharps.
I would wait until the teacher had left
and I would play what my heart heard.

I think I was practicing for you, Mother,
for when we were both too old
to be told what too play.  I was moved
to the bench in the Senior Citizen music room.
I asked them to move you closer so maybe
deafness could be replaced by thrum of
my heart: “Robin’s Return”.  How apropos
that you would say, “That’s always been my favorite song.”

Tags: A Family, Poems by Shewolf
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Tiny footprints on the lake;
dancing invisible beings sky-diving
when the cloud hide’s the sun’s eyes.

Our fathers would have licked us
had they seen us stripped naked,
arching into the canal
just beyond the clutch of bushes
that screened us from their view.

Boney bent ballerinas
budding bolder in the cool water
as we synchronized slipping
in up to our knobby knees,
braving it further to our thin thighs,
finally doubling over to wet
our branchy arms, bringing
water to our freckled faces

and then,

the decision
to throw ourselves completely in
or tiptoe out to the jeers of our girlfriends.

What little splashes we were in that life.

The canal went dry, and so did our lives.
The closest thing to skinny dipping
is when we go out in the rain
without the raincoats our mothers
warned us to take with us, to let
the sky hide footprints of sorrow
splatting on our sagging breasts.

Can’t tell the raindrops from the paindrops.

Tags: Poems by Shewolf
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An arrow is nothing without its bow,
A bow is nothing without its arm,
An arm is nothing without its heart
A heart is nothing without its soul
A soul is nothing without its Creator
Riverside Louis parted the foam in the can,
danced in his blue jean regalia down the center line
in his crooked little dance.  Children gathered
to follow him through his wild wrangle
with his bottle and his bravado.  He loved them
and their pure passion for freedom
and someone to clap and laugh attentively.

Adults smiled to see his alcoholic antics
and encouraged him with another dollar,
another can to crush.  His joy was contagious,
although joy was brewed and stewed
in well-bound kegs.  He was entertainment
in a hard place where the only compensation
for the reservation was to find someone wilder.

When mothers called their clutch for dinner,
Louis was often left standing under the streetlight,
that strobed its reluctant goodnight.  Out of shadows
drew Louis’ disciples who hung one very word
hoping he would lean against the tin railings
under the bridge and leave his sacramental
wine free for the lip service.

Louis, old enough to wobble without the booze,
curled against a cardboard mattress while his family
went to tent meeting to pray for his soul. Their revival
could be heard through the crushed can community.
It almost drowned out the song of the loon
on the channel that sang to Louis.  It almost covered
the crying of children left home to the preying
night animals that do their deeds at night,
when parents forget their true callings.  A pack
of persuasive pretend popes passed the basket
and practiced paying the devil for their native souls.

The voice of Creator quivered against bridge metal plating
and drew Louis to its song, like a bowstring
fitted with a fine arrow drawn by a compassionate hand.
Louis stretched out in his sleep and was smoothed
by the hand of God who loved this man more
for being a burden carrier, than he did those
crusading under a canvas full of town criers.

An arrow is nothing without its bow
A bow is nothing without its arm,
An arm is nothing without its heart
A heart is nothing without its soul
A soul is nothing without its Creator

Author notes
I have watched false prophets feed on the frustrated who can be easily led. I have watched watered-down wickedness step over the salt of the earth; the real and raw because they offered no coins for their coffers. A spiritual leader does not recruit, they walk their walk and are joined by those who the spirit leads to them. So many crooked arrows that become splintered and weak when put to the test of the bow. True leaders are the ones who are too humble to call themselves such. True Medicine people are known by their tiniest miracles in reality; all else is misbegotten. Be careful who pulls you from your quiver.
 

Tags: Poems by Shewolf
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