Tsalagi Poems

I have posted a few of my Cherokee poems. I may post some short stories and excerpts later.

the long man

grandfather, the Long Man, came down from the hills
to the green valleys of the Smokey Mountains,
where grandmother sent her love in the four directions,
giving life to our mother Selu, and our father Kanati,
and the cedar tree and the strawberry,
the swiftly running deer, the hare in the underbrush,
the tiny thrush with throbbing heart.

beside the river I married the white-skinned stranger,
and he lived with me in my mother’s house,
and we bathed each morning in the icy waters
and said our prayers to the spirit of creation,
counting our sorrows on dogwood blossoms
until the soldiers came with their guns,
and forced us to leave the old man behind.

I no longer say my prayers to the Long Man.
my children speak the white man Jesus’ tongue;
the rivers that once healed our red souls
have no use but to wash away the wastes
–the shit, the pesticides and the pcbs–
and my yearning to go home again
is just the ghost of ancestor’s whispering.