the streets

I got up and drove maybe three hours to attend a meeting, it was
about transportation planning along the Salt Lake Valley, somewhere in
the midst of the valley there are some Indian scrip lands, these lands
were given to Indians before there were allotments and reservations,
dating way back to the 1840's. Well someone is thinking about building
a road and called a scoping meeting to talk about the impacts it would
have. There were peiople from the state, government, EPA, Corps of
Engineers, city planners, convservation and wilderness protection
societies, LIke the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. The meeting was
such that alot of folks were there with white linen shirts, prim and
proper in their attire. It was in a way a domonstration in the art of
word form, how to say something in a way that made one think these
guys are professionals in their work, if you couldn't tell by the way
they looked they said it.

I finished the meeting and went to look for someone, there is a park,
they call it the Pioneer Park in Salt Lake City, it is near the
downtown area on the west side. It is green, with tall cottonwood
trees, it is allegedly where the Mormon Pioneers first camped when
they came into the Salt Lake Valley. Now it is a park and there are
alot of people around there, mainly poor people.


I got a call to go and find someone, a girl from home who took off and
was living on the streets, so I went to the park to take a look
around. I took a few pieces of chicken with me, and found that this
park has rez dogs, a few followed me around they smelled the chicken,
so I ended up giving into them and it was gone.


IN noticed there were tall old fashioned turn of the century lamps,
something like you see in tose movies about Jake the Ripper in old
England, tall dark towering lights, cast iron, at the base of these
lamps on four sides is the figure of a cigar store Indian. Past these
lamp posts are the green lawns of the park and lots of old trees.
Laying around these trees I found a few Indian folks, they were from
all over, not just them but some other people of color as well,
Mexicans, Blacks and some Whites. I found myself walking among them
and saw some people who looked like peiople I knew from the streets.
The Skins there spoke to me in Navajo, asking my clan relationship and
where I was from. They rold me where they were from and I asked about
Charlene, the girl I was looking for from home, she isn't exactly a
girl but a mother who took off and left her kids with family and
somehow ended up in Salt Lake City living on the streets.


I notice the people I spoke with looked at m directly in the eye,
curious as to why I was looking for her and wanting to help out, some
said we will put the work out to find her. They said at noon, the
shelter feeds everybody and to be hang around to see if she should up.
A few of them knew of her and said she had been around. I walked
around the park to see if I could find her.


I saw an Indian woman swinging on the childrens swings, and she was
just like a child swinging up high and gonig back and forth, reaching
her toes to the sky. She swung for a long time. I thought to talk to
her, but she seemed to be thinking about something, her long brown
hair just flowed with the swing going back and forth. People would
walk by and look at her, wondering why she was there like I was. After
a while when I was coming back from across the park, I saw her and
could see she was walking with crutches, her body movements were jerky
and then I could see she had muscular distrophy. Earlier as I watched
her I wondered about how Indians thrive in the city, they get by and
know each other, moving from the forest, mesas and plains to the city
sidewalks. There are invisible it seems, I saw a small child playing
with his parents and they were just enjoying the sunshine and shade of
the trees, drinking nothing but water from a old coke bottle and
sharing a loaf of bread, a simple pleasure. This is what I saw and
wondered about where they came from to get here.


Anyway I am still looking for this girl from home and will be here
through the night checking around for her, so it goes on the streets
of Salt Lake City.


Rustywire

Dawn Girl

In the early morning, when the sweet taste of dew is on the land, just
a taste of sweet life, it shines in the early light and the air is
crisp and clean she runs. In the days of summer, winter and windblown
fall and under the slim showers of spring she runs to East, along the
horizon where the beginning of day chases the night away. In the early
light of blue black skys she sees the hint of turquoise blue, in the
shimmer of gray light, a tint of pink, blue and gold she runs to the
break of day, always to the east.

Running with leggings, buckskin wrapped, in red mocassins this navajo
girl with long black hair, she runs her legs moving against the
ground, across the long distant mesas, across the flat lands, running
along the rainbows edge. Can you see her, she is beating the ground
with the sound of her feet, her heart pounds and she breathes in the
whistling wind, it is a the rhythm of the new day, a new life, the old
of yesterday falls away with the night.


In this light I can see her run, far away to the South, along the
horizon, racing along it's edge. Grandfather would say to me it is
time to get up, she has beaten you already, you must catch up. Slowly
my eyes opened to see the wooden ceiling, and the dim light of a
kersone lamp sitting on the table in the middle of the room. The sound
of sparrows singing flows through th e window.


These sounds come to mind the slight flutter of wings, the thunk of my
tennis shoes slipping on to my feet, and the squeek of the screen door
and the scrunch of the ground as I could hear my feet walking along
the path going east through the cedar trees, the faint light of day on
the horizon.


She is running and I step forward to catch her, she is fast that one.
I wonder what she looks like, limber, with long strides, her hair
rustling with the breeze, if she were to look at me she would say to
me, don't you see it is time to clear your mind, think about what is n
front of you, the stillness of the sage, the sound of the wind flowing
through the trees and rabbit brush. I slowly run step by step and see
the trail before me, it is just before first light and I am running to
meet the day.


I can see the colors of dawn, and far off to the East I run to see it.
The sound comes to mind, the song and the chant. A time for summer
sings, and the beautyway.


In beauty it begins, may goodness find me
Let the beauty way follow me where ever I go,
Let there be beauty before me
Let there be beauty behind me
Let there be beauty to the left of me
Let there be beauty to the right of me
In all that I do let there be beauty
Let me wrap my self in it


Hozhoji,
Hozhogo Nahasdlii
Hshoogo Hahasdlii


Restore me with beauty
Restore me with beauty


So I run to meet the Dawn
Dawn Girl runs on the horizon
She has beaten me again.

rustywire

A Traditional Pow Wow Dancer

Sam short for Sammaripa, he is a traditional dancer, been dancing a
long time. Had a chance to share a meal with him just the other day.
He drives a truck and works on them too. His hands are gnarled and he
is tall, with long gray hair. He comes from someplace around Pyramid
Lake I think. he told me but I have forgotten. He is a Paiute, maybe
Western Shoshoe, can't really remember. He has been working for long
time, maybe 40 years or so at the same job.

We shared a meal of indian tacos, fry bread with beans, a little
hamburger and a little hot sauce with cheese. There was a table
outside the tribe store and so we sat out there to enjoy the sun and
warm weather. His eyes are gray, and he has many grandchildren.


I asked him if he was going to any pow wows over Memorial Day, he
looked at me with steady eyes, he has always had eyes the somehow see
beyond, they look straight into you. He told me they were headed to
the Pow Wos in Las Vegas, somewhere Northwest of there.


It's going to be hot, Sam are you ready for the sun down there. He
took a bite of his frybread and I could see the gleem of his gold
teeth. He said, the first dances of the season are the tough ones over
the long winter, the old bones have to get in tune with the music. I
can usually last one long dance . bit by the end of the summer you can
go maybe six dances. It makes you tough.


I could see him sitting there in his work clothes worn and gray with
age, but in the arena he wears an eagle bustle, with a head full of
eaglel feathers. His wife is from the Northwest and she wears a heavy
buckskin. He said they were going to make a family trip, take the
grandkids down there and dance for the weekend. He has a van he uses
just for pow wows, after years on the pow wow circuit he knows what to
take and how to camp. He said one year they took three tipis, and set
them up, this year it is just going to be one, this weekend down
there.


He told me that the kids like to dance, it is good for them to know
the people who go there, the other tribes, and families. They all get
to know each other.
He finished his lunch and said he had to work on getting a dozer from
the forest, it broke down, threw a rod. He said it would take a new
engine to get it going again. We sat there and talked for a bit and
maybe an hour went by, he spoke about the way of dancing, and his
home, that no one was there anymore around his age, and so he was
going to retire where his kids lived. He told me it doesn't really
matter where you end up, but how you do no matter where you go. This
place is now his home he said and he likes to dance, and with that he
hopes to see his grandchildren dance with him and learn about the way
of living in a good way. We talked about the drought, no water for
planting, and a little about the upcoming 4th of July and how he
planned to camp. He said we have already set up our tapes to mark the
place where we are going to camp this year. Across the way we could
see the pow wow grounds and some indian folks were already marking out
their campsites for the 4th of July.


I had to leave and so said take it easy on the road down there and
left him sitting there finishing his iced tea. It was a warm day and
he is down there now at Snow Mountain kicking up the dust with his
grandchildren and his wife and they will be headed home on Monday
night to get up and work like he has for the past 40 years. Sammaripa
is a traditional dancer and he is dancing for his children and for the
sheer joy of it.


rustywrie

Parched Corn

Grandpa, what you doing, Grandpa? He stood there, just three years
old, his hair dark and eyes full of wonder as he watched his grandpa
digging a hole in the sand.

I am going to make something good to eat, it is a day for eating corn.
The old man said, lining the pit with cedar wood and piling it up
high, and it began to burn.


The little boy watched as the fire grew, standing behind the old man,
holding his pants by the legs. It's sure hot, Grandpa. The sun was
shining and they stood on a high butte behind their place, they could
see the distant mountains and valleys below Fluted Rock..


The old man knelt down and said, see that place way down there, there
was slit of earth where Canyon De Chelly dropped down into the earth.
In that place our people lived long ago and they grew corn, some of
them saved the corn like we have and they dried. Now when they did
this they would soak it in water to give it softness again, like the
ones I have here.


The little boy with shaggy hair looked at the indian corn, and could
see it had been soaking in the tub since the night before.


What you going to do with it grandpa?


We are going to eat it.


Like that? Too hard to eat.


The old man laughed and shoveled out the hot coals, and said no, we
are going to cook it over night right here. The old man shoveled out
the coals and lined the pit and threw in the dried ears of corn now
soaked and packed them into the ground with sand, the old man then
poured lots of water buckets on it.


How can we eat it if its all covered up grandpa?


It has to cook in the ground.


The little boy looked at his grandpa with big eyes, eyes full of
wonder about how the ground could cook the corn. The old man put the
hot coals over the corn covered with earth and built a big fire.


The fire burned all day and the little boy played as his grandfather
watched the fire, until the night came.


It was dark, and the fire lit up the night sky. The embers lit up the
sky, floatin gslowly into the night sky. The ground was glowing gold
and yellow.


Is the corn ready to eat grandpa?


No, not till tomorrow.


How come we are going to eat it tomorrow. I want to eat some now


The old man told him that a long time ago when their people were on
the run from the cavalry soldiers they hid the corn in the canyon
walls, and it dried. It was in secret places, and when they needed
they gathered it and soaked it in the stream. They they went up into
the mountains to the East, near where we are now and built a fire like
this. sometimes they just threw the corn into the fire and let it burn
on the edges.


The boy asked did the corn burn all up? The corn would be all dirty
and black grandpa. The old man told him that corn originated with th
eholy peoplel, that it was gift, it was from the four kernels of the
corn, the very top, white corn, the most hard to find, from that corn
we got our strength and it made us survive.


Did you eat that corn grandpa, the kind that was thrown in the fire?


Yes I did, a long time ago when I was a child.


They sat there and the boy listened to the old man talk about how the
old ones survived and the foods they ate, all the time watching the
fire burn down to just hot coals.


When do we get to eat corn grandpa.


Tomorrow, let's go to bed.


As they went to sleep the fire burned down and by morning was just a
pile of coals. The little boy jumped out of bed and ran outside, he
saw the old man kneeling down. He had already shovelled out the dirt
and coals and was pulling out the ears of corn. The old man brushed
the wet sand from the corn.


He took one out and slowly peeled it back, it was all cooked and a
little brown around the top. His grandpa told him this is sacred corn
it comes from down the valley and gives us life, strength and food for
us to eat.


The little boy held the peeled corn by the husk and looked at it. It
smelled sweet, and he tasted just a little bit of it. It tasted so
sweet and good. This is good corn grandpa. The old man laughed and
picked up the rest of the corn and put it in a bag and started to
walkd back to the hogan. The little boy ran around to his grandma and
mom and said, look grandpa cooked this sweet corn, parched corn, it is
steaming, so it is steamed corn. He held it up in his hands and they
all laughed because they knew he learned what good corn was, and they
remembered that he was just little boy and had tasted the sweetness of

moving them up the mountain...a story about summer sheep camp

Tomorrow is Saturday, she will rise early to go high in the mountains,
a place called Lake Canyon way up in the Uintahs South of the Duchesne
River. The summer comes slow here, the snow stays long and about this
time of the year it is time for cattle to graze. She will wake him her
husband, and son and tell them let's get ready to go. 179 head she
has, 8 bulls and 9 horses. The roads up the mountain fall away into
deep ruts but she said we will get up there, time for Indian cattle,
them cows to graze way up high.

Way back in 1897, they came with their horses, whitemen who said this
is a good place and took the land, the mountains, the forests and
trees, the lakes of sweet water and tall grass and said this is the
Uinta Forest, named for them Indians who used to camp there, but were
there anymore. They live on the rez now, but insome old books, it
says, this is your land from Mountaintop to Mountaintop. The is what
was promised them way back then. The United States said we will use
your forest but we will remember it was your land, and you and your
people can graze your animals up here, there is enough room for 2000
or so, and so the made the words on paper back in 1906.


There came a time when the grass was lean and the cows many, more
white farmers and cattlemencame into the valley, and they said we need
to graze with your herds up in the forest. So the US said, there their
forest service, let us borrow your grazing there is enough to go
around, just for year or so, which lasted 7 winters and 8 summers. The
Indians took their cows up high and found that there was only short
grass and other cattle with strange brands. Where shall we put our
animals they said to the forest people. They said, we looked at the
place and since you havenot been here for a long time we said to
ourselves the indians don't want this place any more they have other
places and so we put those with a greater need for feed on this land.
Look there is still more than enough grass for you and they pointed to
the mountains to the morht and said go there. It was about 1938 or so,
a generation had lost the land to the south.


Over the years, the grass grew and then came the forest men, we need
to borrow some of your grazing for just a short while and so they took
the land away from those indians with faith in the words written in
paper from 1906 and said out father in washingtion will look out for
us. It was after the big war, maybe 1949 when they found out that the
borrowed grass was gone forever. So it went day after day, month after
month year after year, until 1969 when Lake Canyon came back to them,
for just a little bit, it was theirs but for a small fee, they said.
We know about what we said in 1906, and just to let you know we see
that there were words written back then, but we are letting you know
that we agree with you that the words are there but that we say we
agree to disagree. The Indians said what does that mean. The forest
men said it means we will look to the wisdom of our people in
washington to say what is right in the way of working the land with
you, bring your cattle and use it there, just sign this paper and pay
a little bit to help out the money pot in Washington. So the tribe
said ok we will follow along and put our trust in these words.


It is May and the time has gone by, in the old days they hitched the
wagons and brought food, the family gathered taking their horses with
them and made camp moving those lazy cows up the mountain. The indian
woman stood there and said to me, I remember my grandmother cooking
for us, and we would dance and play riding horses, all my undles came
and worked hard, but at night we would sing and play and listen to the
stories about soldier summit how the cavalry put those old indians
high on the mountain, a campsite that was so cold by fall that nothing
could live and so the old indians slipped away. Look up there to the
South on the Mountain beyond the trees, a small valley taht is the
place where it happened they say. It is where she learned to ride a
horse, to stand in the saddle, where she dreamed she would name her
child a long time before he was ever born for the way the sun burst
over the mountain and rushed into the valley like a charging warrior
racing to the other side of the valley, he was a dog soldier but when
he was born she called him Long Soldier and he stood there a short
ways away listening to his mother talk abouthim years ago at the place
on the mountain. Her eyes were gleeming, and they were bright. She
stood there with her long black hair and said we will move the cattle
up there and camp this weekend like we used to. She had made good for
the journey.


She woke up early, way before dawn and with her man and his cousins,
her sons and aunts and uncles headed those cattle to travel miles
across the valley and up the mountain where the roads are steep and
gullies deep and wide, using chains and come alongs to keep the trucks
from falling down the mountain. They will get there tomorrow evening,
partway. I stood there and listened to her tell it to me, the way they
would go. She was born to ride a horse, an indian cow woman, ready for
anything.


I stood there and listened to them, but I knew as I stood there that
the forest men, from the United States, had said, the indians don't
need that place anymore and so we have others who need it more, and so
they gave the forest service grazing permit, the one given for the
forest on the reservation boundary to a white man. I listened to her
and then said, I heard the permit is not yours anymore. She stood
there, her eyes flashing ans looked at me and said no one has said it
to us and we are going up there like we have always done and that is
what we are doing in the morning. I said maybe you should check first
and she said, it is our land, our forest and the bones of my fathers
are buried there and we are going, and so she walked away from me and
will make ready to push her cattle up the mountain and in a small
valley way up high in the Uintahs at a place called Lake Canyon in the
Uinta forest will see if the words written in 1906 are true or whether
they are a lie. So it goes on the Uintah and Ouray. The forest service
has revoked the Lake Canyon permit that belonged to the Ute Tribe and
has given it to non-Indina despite an agreement made with them that
this would never happen for their grazing area in this rough canyon
country used by their people for centuries.

chasing he dragon...a sad story on gambling it all away

it was full, all those gathered round standing room only, the smoke
was thick in the air, heavy with sweat, cheap perfume and whiskey, bad
breath and some who hadn't taken a bath in days.

Come on, baby, Hard 8, Hard 8, just a few turns of those bones, 10 on
the line, 5 on the come, and 3 on Hard 8.


Come on shooter, 8, 8, don't be late. He picked those two white gems
and rolled them in his fingers, the old guys sitting a little ways
away watched him like a hawk. He was up, had made the point 4 times,
took his 54 across and made it 300, 91 on placed on 8.


Oh, man let me make this number, just one time lord, let me have this
day, let me roll for an hour maybe more, just a few more. he stopped
and with his left hand picked up some quarter chips, dropped down 50
on the pass, and with tem times odd, dropped six more hehind. He
picked up some nickels and made a call bet, Three WAY 8 on the turn!
Pyaoff was fifteen to one, he could taste it the next roll was his.


The people were standing wide eyed dropping their chips on the table,
wanting to squeeze every damn dime they could out off that table, he
was gonna roll them bones all night.


A woman, all liquored up, saw his Washington Redskin cap, maroon it
was and said, Cat in the Hat, roll that 8, and we can party till dawn.
She was a real breezer, dress slit up the side and her every breath
took the table away from the action to look at her just standing there
ready to fall out. Man what a sight.


Hold them gently, those two bones, black spots, three and three
staring straight up, the noise was loud, everyone was shouting, HEY
MAKE THAT 8.


It was Tuesday morning, early, maybe 5, couldn't tell there were no
clocks around, the air was thick with hanging white clouds, you
couldn't see the walls. He forgot to call in, was supposed to have
been home, Saturday had stopped off to play a little dice. Ended up
standing there three days and nights, finding a dive for $22 a night,
cheap steaks for 4 and a quarter. What a life, nothing stops.


Had run a little low on Saturday, dropped 400 off the bat, went to the
machine three times and maxed out ont the daily limit, went to cage
and found an advance for 12.50 in change, he was there four times in
one day. It was really bad those bones, they weren't rolling the way
they should. Got to stay in the game it will come, my roll will come.


Down, a little, maybe 1800. The rent can wait, the llittle lady better
not shop for food this weekend, she should know I might need a little
to get me by. don'e look at the atm receipts, stuffed them all in the
back pocket and it was full.


He had stepped up to the table and started with 40 and had thrown
seven three times in a row, hit a Hard 6, then a five, and look at how
the chips were all coming his way, gotta get even, gotta get even, go
home a winner, man it would be nice to go home a winnner. I am not
loser.


The dice rolled his way, the chips stacked up, this is why I came, to
put it all out there, can't make any money if you don't risk it. The
dealers eyes were narrow slits, easy smiles, drop one on the line for
the boys. He said fifteen across, and they took it down when it hit,
no they didn't let it stay out there. Come on Cat in the Hat, put
something on the line for the boys, they chanted.


He was up there, and the chips were flowing in, I am a winner, this is
the roll I have been waiting for, come eight, don't be late, four by
four, let me see it. He shook the dice with one hand, the blonde said
let me blow on it for you and she brushed against him, he forgot about
the game for second, his libido went into high gear, but then the
thought of all that green at the end of the table brought him home. He
let them roll gently off his hand, just hard enough they bounced off
the wall. Hate a soft shooter, hate that soft seven. Oh, man what are
you thinking. The dice rolled on down banking off the wall, everyone
cheared, there it was four by four, hard 8, the dice started to
settle. Oh, man let me see the next roll, I can double my money, 3200
on the table, it can be 6400 the next roll, Two more rolls and man
10K, what a way to go home. The dice finally settled, a drunk tripped
and hit the table. just a little but it was enough, the four turned to
three and it rolled out a seven. SEVEN. A cry went up and they all
turned away. A few started to swear, I knew he was loser. damn him.
What the hell, and more they said. The dealers were fast, the wiped
the table clean, grabbing up those chips all piled up, no 8, just
seven. he stood there with 35.00 and change. Oh, man, it's gone. The
thought of owing rent, making excuses to man he hated to pay, oh, man
I forgot to call in yesterday, it's three hours to 8, I won't be in
today. too far to drive, need to sleep. Oh, man, there's enough canned
food to cover us till next payday. how about gas to get home. The
crowd was gone and he stepped back, new faces gathered around and
shouted at the next shooter. come on seven eleven. Dealer yelling,
after seven comes eleven.


Oh, what have done. I could've cashed in and walked away. Just once I
wanted to win, to be the hero, come home a winner. What is wrong with
me, nothing. It just goes that way, next time you will get them. Wait,
I don't own anything on the car, maybe I could pawn the title, for
cool thou and make it back and take care of it tomorrow. Yeah wait,
just a day and go home a winner. He smiled wanely and walked out into
the early light of dawn, wanting to hide from the day looking for
night, a place to crash. When I wake up, I'll call in, yeah I just
need one good roll, just one more time and that's it.


Tell me, placing four and ten pays off two to one, but then there are
six ways to roll a seven, it is chasing the dragon and you can lose
more than just a life.

beyond two grey hills

it was on the road to Shiprock, the narrow trail of black asphalt that
winds it way to the horizon, along tis path over time the footsteps
and sound of horses have been muffled by the wind and sage. Way beyond
the sight of any road in the cleft of a hill, there sits a small
wooden house with an old green roof. In that place the sights, sounds
of laughter, children and work made life easy. Hauling water, cutting
fire wood waiting to go school before the early light of day, watching
the sun rise and set and laying a trail of colors from blue, to black,
gold, yellow, pink and Navajo red. In the silence of the open road the
voices, songs of old come to mind. Sitting listening to the old men,
and the old women as the spoke of things that happened before my life
began, when there were no chidis-cars on the road. In silence I pass
the place called Burnham Junction and head South to Albuquerque
through Gallup, and looking west I can see the place of my births, the
line of my father going back.

There is no one there now, the place is empty, the wind howls and it
is cold outside. Who will know the stories of the people there, the
times and winter sings. Tell me Grandfather where this road I travel
will lead, it has taken me far from home and in passing here I see but
glimpse of light on the horizon, Where does it go?


Twin Heros, sitting at the head of the earth, navajo mountain, can you
see me run along the edge of the horizon, looking for a place to rest.
The cold wind blows, and is just before early light. I drive on and my
heart crys for the home I have left behind. It is there just over the
hill. I want find the beauty way, and it is beyond my sight, where
does this road go. It goes to places foreign and I long to turn
around. Hozhogo nahasdlii...