Always, they were out there, in a field of boulders
the size of bears hunched over. O, you were silky
with fur, with a sharp smell I could not get enough of.
I fell into a dream of milk and skin,
Can’t hear things well if they are things whispering. Nothing gentle to
hand on back of hand. A horsehair bow across gut string.
closer to it at fifteen because
I didn’t know anything: my heart
so near the surface of my skin
The homeless are not afraid
to miss something.
What passes through their eyes
is how the clouds pass over the rushing cars,
the way pigeons miss some of the seeds
on the road and move away.
Yet only they know
what it means to have a home
and to return to it.
living Indians at Feather Falls
leave tobacco to mark that, indeed,
we're still here, lungs full of indigenous air.
our planet of women is nothing more than a dream. who knows
how many of us bathe in the woods or which ones of us have
wings that let us fly with our flesh? it’s not for anyone to know.