Red Indian Road West:
Native American Poetry
from California
Edited by Kurt Schweigman
and Lucille Lang Day
Introduction by James Luna
Red Indian Road West received a 2016 Artists Embassy International Literary/Cultural Arts Award and a 2017 PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award.
Contributors: Indira Allegra, Judi Brannan Armbruster, J.P. Dancing Bear, Nanette Bradley Deetz, E.K. Cooper, Roberta Reyes Cordero, Lucille Lang Day, Natalie Diaz, Carolyn Dunn, Jennifer Elise Foerster, Jewelle Gomez, Janice Gould, Alison Hart, John Hershman, Senna Heyatawin, Dave Holt, Frank LaPena, Sharmagne Leland-St. John, James Luna, Sal Martinez, Shaunna Oteka McCovey, Stephen Meadows, Deborah A. Miranda, Manny Moreno, Catherine Nelson-Rodriguez, Linda Noel, Wendy Rose, Sylvia Ross, Kurt Schweigman, Marlon Sherman, Kim Shuck, Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez.
From Red Indian Road West:
CHUMASH MAN
“Shoo-mash,” he says
and when he says it
I think of ancient sea lion hunts
and salt spray windswept
across my face
They tell him
his people are dead
“Terminated”
It’s official
U.S. rubber-stamped official
Chumash: Terminated
a People who died
they say
a case for anthropologists
Ah, but this old one
this old one whose face is
ancient prayers come to rest
this old one knows
who he is
“Shoo-mash,” he says
and somewhere sea lions still gather
along the California coast
and salt spray
rises
rainbow mist
above the constant breaking
of the waves
—Georgiana Valoyce-Sanchez: Chumash
CROW DANCE
Black crow sits on a pine tree,
white clouds against an azure sky.
North wind whispers her secrets
as crow listens
from the top of the Earth.
We watch each other
from different galaxies,
circles intersecting circles,
as the waters of the San Francisco Bay
flow around us.
Crow begins his dance
as squirrel appears
from behind the pine tree.
Butterfly and dragonfly watch,
as our galaxies intersect
for one moment,
under a pine tree by the Bay,
dancing
from the top of the Earth.
—Nanette Bradley Deetz: Lakota/Dakota/Cherokee