Honor Dance for the Four Winds
Chrystos
[This poem is read by the author ]
Because we are sacred to each other
you create a feast for us to share
placed carefully on newspaper
Each grain of rice
a memory of freedom
Each bean a song of respect
I am giving you all the stars Ive seen
I am bringing you the moon in my voice
I am dancing you old mountains
Wind riding wild ponies
through canyons of our pain
I am covering each of you in a shawl
with long silky fringe & deeply colored roses
I am folding blankets for you
in blazing patterns
I carry you carefully in my eyes
on all my journeys
I dream nightly of the keys I will forge
of your loneliness, cradled smooth
Trapped in walls of hatred that I so rarely breach
listening for the birds who fly over razor wire coils
your spirits rise before me
I am burning sweet grass
sage & cedar
as each dawn I call your names
This poem appears in Fire Power 1995.
Chrystos also reads Marilyn Buck’s “Authenticity.”
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poems © the authors
compilation © The Freedom Archives