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taught her
    to sing in the shawl
    snug about her shoulders

Urban Indian: Portrait 3
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    he stares across a vacant sea
    of asphalt and pulls both hands
    across his belly slanted
    to his hip
    and recalls the great canoe
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    they paddled out of Kitimat
    then down Hecate Strait
    and into Queen Charlotte Sound
    the summer he was twelve
    and he can still feel the muscle
    of the channel on his arm
    the smell of it
    potent, rich, eternal
    the smell of dreams and visions
    thunderbirds dancing
    orca chasing raven
    across the slick surface
    of the sea
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    he crosses to his closet
    and retrieves the tools and wood
    and paints he stores there
    bundles it in the button blanket
    he danced in once
    and heads down the stairs
    out into the street
    to find the kids
    he teaches to carve paddles now
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    the ocean
    phosphorescent
    in the moonlight
    what he brings to them

Grandfather Talking 2 — Teachings
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    me I never thought that bein’ Injun
    was any diff’rent than someone else
    we see the same sky, breathe
    the same air, feel the same
    earth under our feet
    and everyone smiles with the sun on their back
    an’ the cool wind on their face
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    us we never knew no better
    than what our teachin’s told us
    and what they say is that us people
    swim out into the world the same
    born innocent us, all of us
    needin’ help and shelter and warm
    skin against our own to tell us
    that this world outside our mother’s belly
    beats with one heartbeat
    like the drum of her heart
    we heard in darkness
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    that’s what teachin’s are meant to do, my boy
    lead us back to that one heartbeat
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    me I remember once long time ago
    when I was small maybe nine, maybe ten
    when we still lived the trap line life
    thirty miles out near One Man Lake
    where the manomin grew thick as the bush
    in the coves an’ bays near our tents
    and I could hear it rustle in the wind at night
    in my blankets on a bed of cedar boughs
    me I went to sleep all summer hearin’ that voice
    like a whisper in my ear all night long
    the promise of the rice
    filling up my dreams
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    anyhow my grandmother says to me one day
    it’s time for me to be a man an’ me
    I thought I was gonna get to hunt
    get my first bear, first moose, first deer
    but she took me walkin’ through the bush
    an’ made me gather sticks and dry wood
    to carry back to camp
    an’ said that I was gonna be the fire-keeper now
    oh, me, my boy, I wanted to hunt so bad
    and makin’ fire didn’t seem no warrior kind of thing
    to me an’ I made a big sad face at her
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    well her she sat me down beside her
    and never said nothing for the longest time
    until she raised a hand and pointed around our camp
    â€œsee the Old Ones,” she said to me
    â€œsee how they sit close to that fire to warm their bones?
    see how they like that lots?”
    me I seen that and it made me smile
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    â€œsee them young ones,” she said
    â€œsee how they run to that fire for their soup
    see how happy in the belly they are?”
    I seen that too me
    â€œtonight,” the old lady said
    â€œthe storyteller will sit at that fire and us
    we’ll sit there too and hear the voice of magic in the night,
    that fire throwin’ sparks like spirits
    flyin’ in the air all around us all
    and us we’ll feel happy in that togetherness
    like we done for generations now here
    on the shore of this lake with the sound
    of the wind in the trees like the sound
    of the Old Ones whisperin’ our names.”
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    me I seen that too an’ I looked at her
    and my face wasn’t so big and sad no more
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    â€œyou bring the fire here,” she said
    â€œyou light the flame where we gather
    an’ you cause all that to be, my boy
    you take care of us that way
    keep us warm, keep us fed, keep us happy
    every stick you gather is a part of that
    a part of learnin’ how to care