After listening to an Amerindian read his stuff at a poetry reading here in Portland, I pretty much knew what the subject matter of my next poem would be. His “poetry” turned out to be an angry prosaic tirade against white people, and it went on and on and on.
I, being mostly a mix of white, didn’t feel it applied to me, because I wasn’t the one who caused so much injury to his ancestors. As I listened, I found myself reflecting on the fact that pretty much anyone raised on American soil is a Native American. Looking at it animistically, I realized that we grow up immersed in the ghosts of Amerindian ancestry, as well as a growing mix of other ancestries.
This strain of thought led me to reflect further: The food we eat, the water we drink, everything. Barring imports, it all ultimately comes from the ground we live on. So we are quite literally made of—manifest from—the bodies and psyches of our Native American ancestors, regardless of race. How could we escape it? They are as much our ancestors at this point as they are the ancestors of the Amerindians, because we—white, black, red, or yellow—are re-manifest from the very same atoms and psychic engrams.
This would have to cause some degree of spiritual ambivalence, at best. And so my 5th hybridanelle poem.
Legacy
an essence rises from the land into our spirits
a touch like the raven’s down dispersed on a maiden flight
that permeates our souls with an otherworldly memory
in one ear seethes resentment deep and bitter
reflections of a suffering long endured
and in the other burns remorse as sour
this land is an amalgam of disembodied psyches
its rivers and rocks infused with their enigmatic drift
an essence rises from the land into our spirits
as one hand grips a wound too deep to bear
the other twists a blade that lightly glimmers
reflections of a suffering long endured
we drink of water filled with transcendental engrams
a sense emerges in all who share in its natural course
that permeates our souls with an otherworldly memory
as one arm holds a steady hand for moments
and all the warriors freeze in sober pause
the other twists a blade that lightly glimmers
like sea-mist on the wind our minds are touched by phantoms
immersed in their love and hate—a plight we cannot escape
an essence rises from the land into our spirits
one eye sees arrows pierce men to their rest
another watches bullets drop their targets
and all the warriors freeze in sober pause
the waking world is brim with long forgotten relics
their shapes reduced to the dust we breathe from the fragrant air
that permeates our souls with an otherworldly memory
one hero’s war-lance slaughters human objects
the rage that sent it warm upon the blood
another watches bullets drop their targets
all ancestries are fused in our subconscious insights
we dream their atrocities—their advances and retreats
an essence rises from the land into our spirits
that permeates our souls with an otherworldly memory
each side is long remembered in our veins
in one ear seethes resentment deep and bitter
the rage that sent it warm upon the blood
and in the other burns remorse as sour
Publication History:
Blackmail Press (web-based) — Spring 2006
