My Friends in MoJo Country
This month is supposed to be the coldest, with lots of snow; it is is anything but. Snow cleanses the air, provides much needed moisture for the earth and all living things. Cold purifies. We are not only in a surge of this new variant to the virus that is plaguing us but the air is stagnant and the isolation is encouraging reckless behavior.
There have been so many losses but i need to remind that there are equally many, many blessings and paths to those blessings. My poem for this month, “Mile Marker 605″— speaks to the theme of roadkill, which can take a variety of forms each filled with a kind of heavy grief.
We are in a time of change, not only a period of mourning at the loss of people dear to us but other things are going away for which we have yet to feel the full frontal force of impact. What happens when the seasons we have depended upon no longer arrive as we count on them?
Be well. It is better that we cope together rather than make sense of the trauma in isolation set apart.
Lois
Mile Marker 605
by Lois Red Elk
These tracks under our spines
have lead us to where nervous
rays from a coyote sun laid this
red road full of bloody tracks
from stories to real, stories that
never gave up their death songs
even while surviving. Right now,
we’re in no hurry, must seek all
lessons. Injured frames need time,
time to speak out loud, time to heal,
and these times are marked to unfold
in private places between sound sleep
with taku wakan, the unknown holy,
and fresh awakenings to sweet grass
energy. Blood will dry and flake away
heart pain. That veiled sickness that
kept us weighted and alone will be
given to waiting hawks and circling
eagles to be carried away to declining
places. Bruised voices will clear into
victory songs. We’ll walk together
each holding gifts from the Great Spirit
till all is mended then fill each prairie
sun with renewed spirits.
©Lois Red Elk
POSTNOTE : We are pleased that Lois is working away on a new collection of poems and will let you know when it is published. In the meantime, ask for her other volumes at your favorite local bookseller: Our Blood Remembers , winner of the best non-fiction award from Woodcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers; Dragonfly Weather ; and Why I Return to Makoce with a foreword from Montana’s recent state poet laureate Lowell Jaeger and nominated for a High Plains Book Award in poetry. Given headlines that continue to appear about the discoveries of new atrocities committed at boarding schools for indigenous children, we encourage you to read Lois’ contribution to MoJo that appeared in June, The Unspeakable Past Of Indian Boarding Schools
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