When Winter Come Read Free

africa’s shores
    i became the waiting outstretched arms
    for those who refused
    to be enslaved
    for those who trusted me
    to rock their babies off to sleep
    my ocean floors    are covered with     his people’s     resistance
    Â Â Â Â i carry their spirit       in every splash i make
    Â Â Â Â Â Â their humming
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â their lost voices
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â their last words
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â have become a part
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â of my sweetest songs
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â when he is whole
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â again
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â when york knows
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â what he is worth, i will well up inside
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â of him and he   will hear
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â them sing.

Watkuweis Speaks
Watkuweis Speaks
    We knew they were coming.
    Our medicine men have been telling
    of their arrival since before I was born.
    When our warriors saw their small herd
    their first thoughts were to kill them all
    and with it the destruction they carried.
    This I also believed they should do
    until I saw the black one
    standing off to the side
    a small mountain
    pretending to be a man
    a man pretending to be on a leash.
    To the unlearned eye he looked to be all alone
    but when I stared at him with my spirit eye
    I could see a great long woman standing behind him
    with her arms crossed
    and a herd of strange-looking buffalo
    large black cats, striped horses
    and other wild beasts like I’d never even seen
    in my dreams
    stretching to where the sun rises.
    I did not know what destruction his death
    would earn us, so I counseled against it
    and talked of the white men who were kind to me
    when I was young and lost
    which caused the warriors to put away their weapons
    and welcome them with open arms.

Without Bibles
Without Bibles
    We were taught generosity to the poor and reverence
for the Great Mystery. Religion was the basis for all
Indian training.
    â€”Ohiyesa, Santee Sioux
    Massa call them heathens
    when them clean they naked flesh
    with ice cold mountain water
    before crawling backward
    into a dark hot hole in the earth
    like they crawling back in the woman
    who first give them life
    sit there an suffer in thick steamy darkness
    with other naked men
    just to sweat an pray
    sweat an sing
    sweat an sweat an sweat
    all the while asking blessings for they family, yours
    they enemy, the land, the water, plants
    an all the animals them share the earth with.
    Sitting in a river a sweat
    be no more than bathing to the captains
    but a blind man can see God
    in everything the red man do.

Whupped
Whupped
    When the Mandan try to kill his wife
    for lying with Sgt. Ordway, it cause
    the captains to place married squaws
    off-limits to the men’s private commerce.
    One a them laugh an brag ’bout having his way
    with a daughter ova chief
    for no more than a empty tobacco box.
    When we learn the Indians believe
    our power can change hands an be gifted
    by passing ’tween a woman’s thighs
    we all takes advantage at every occasion
    an in most every village
    all along the great trip out an back
    With Capt. Clark’s permission, I don’t hesitate
    to enjoy myself an even have my nose opened
    by a Nez Perce woman as beautiful
    an rugged as the land we traveling through.

Like a Virgin
Like a Virgin
    Grown folk don’t walk ’round on the plantation
    holding hands, go for canoe rides or take long walks
    with each other.
    My Nez Perce gal was the first woman I chose
    on my own an that I didn’t have to share with another.
    I find myself staring into her eyes an smiling, learning
    my big buffalo self to move like a turtle in her arms.
    Men in the