Yellow Dog (for Yozo)

Will I discover the yellow dog who lives

within the sunlit garden

of your body, breathing deep

water like old cave walls,

spirals of moisture and aged stone?

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Will I discover the hidden passage,

the lost and forgotten tunnel –

How marvelous to find

a wall of muscled flesh,

how wonderful these beasts, how soft,

as if I had crawled through

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the labyrinth of rock to

come upon a garden of sinew

in the lush bloom of pelt,

all moving in spirals toward

the chambered ceiling, torches flickering.

Smoke carries magic.

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Will I discover a cave of light,

animals dancing in the bloodied

sheath of our lives?

I do not want to be separate from your name.

I do not want to be separate from your skin.

We travel the walled lines of your maze,

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remembering corners, leaving pieces of ourselves

as clues for the return passage.

Deep pools of fur.

I close my eyes,

close my eyes and see

animals dancing on walls

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deep within us

just beyond the light,

flickering.

For those who would compromise the forest

The spirits of the lost trees,

the spirits of the plants,

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the moss spirits, the rock spirits

consign you to a hell of

no birds, a dry spare hell where

your name will not be known –

you will be known as desolation,

ruiner of planets, the lonely soul who

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lives without the friendship of life,

without the solace of species –

the ghosts of those you have

pushed aside will follow you as

you move toward dryness, dust, and empty skies –

Surely goodness and mercy will

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leave your wretched life untouched

as you dwell forever in

a land without life,

trying to remember the sound

of birds, the sound of wind,

the sound of your own heart, beating.

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“snow walker”

Lines of smoke

now vertical, now to the southwest.

Old brush and last year’s wood.

Hunted the caribou, until they were gone.

Cod and salmon, whales tore up the nets.

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His last words:

“What’s all that barking?”

Dogs gone to meet strangers,

entering the village.

Orion the mighty

hunter of winter,

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early in the evening.

Spirits descending.

Walking the earth in coats of fur.

Walking the earth in coats of fur.

Moving along the Milky Way and down,

darkness surrounds,

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awake in the woods,

Walking the earth in coats of fur.

Bear walking north, following glaciers.

Fresh green valleys, the land rising, falling.

Flocks of birds overhead.

Berries and mushrooms.

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Gatherings on river banks,

Pawing at salmon resting in shallows.

Sunlight and salt wind,

wind in our fur,

sun on our backs,

on our backs in

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fresh green grass,

walking north.

After the ground dried

we tasted ice in the meat of animals

for a long time.

Berries grew but never ripened.

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The mountains moved slowly

away from us.

Who can say what anything means?

We watch as the leaves turn color.

Fish come again to the streams,

spawn, and are gone.

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It has always been important to us

that the caribou move freely,

that the grasses return each spring,

the water, running to the sea.

We split open the rocks.

There were faces inside.

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What were they saying?

Caribou Man

He went there in a dream,

to the place where the caribou go,

to the mountain where the caribou go,

mountain not of snow, but of caribou hair.

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He became the Caribou Man,

came to live among them,

eating moss, fathering young,

riding on the backs of the bulls.

He gives meat to the hunters.

He takes care of the caribou.

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“In a dream she came, she called me.

She stepped from the herd,

whispered my name,

Come live as husband

among the caribou.”

We talked with him,

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wishing meat for our families.

He warned that our troubles came

from killing too freely.

We must kill only for food,

To renew tools, tents and clothing.

We must not waste life.

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Their blood is his blood.

Their blood is our blood.

Their dreams are our dreams and he

is one of us.


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