Two Hundred Years

Two Hundred Years

I have swam beneath the ice for two hundred winters
watched two hundred summer suns
shine upon this turbulent sea
saw your kin upon the shore
stepping gently, leaving only footprints
first, then wooden paddle strokes
soon rumbles and streaks in the sky

I have seen your rise
rapid as the moonlight spread across
a tundra plain, and now watch
while the moon-set makes ready
remembering how two hundred years
you watched for my spout
saw hope in the mist
made my grandmother into corsets
carved my mother for a mangled
meal for the bottom crawlers with
war weapons, steel whales
with your men sealed
screaming inside

some of your kind believe we
wield the ability to hear those
thoughts in your head, your actions
are already gale force, only if you listened
long enough at the ocean's edge
everything would crystalize
clear, and two hundred years
you would see from sea




(Poem #1 for the National Poetry Month Challenge by Don Rearden. Here the imagined life of a bowhead whale, the subject of a new novel I'm working on tentatively titled Whale Road.)

Weight of a Paper Warrior

A Spirit Warrior, drawn by one of the boys in Club Ki'l (Kuh-luh) afterschool clubs I've been guest presenting at here in Anchorage.

Weight of a Paper Warrior

I sit on the carpeted classroom floor
encircled
Tlingit, Haida, Aleut, Yup'ik, Inupiaq, Athabascan
city boys
I wear my Raven qaspeq
hand sewn with love by a Yup'ik friend

they close their eyes
the walls around us, and that separate
fall away
my words carry them back in time
to when they were warriors

when they fought for what they believed
to protect their families, their people
to survive

this warrior is still there, I say

in you

listen to him

these were his

a stone knife, an arrowhead, a rabbit bone charm
travel --- small hand to small hand around the circle
for some cool trinkets, for others
a weight to each I will never know

the circle breaks and they lie on sheets
of white butcher paper, draw Crayola silhouettes
then arm and illustrate 

one boy tells me:
my spirit warrior's knife 
was different and sharper
and
he said he will always 
be there when I am scared

another asks:
what did your spirit warrior
look like?

this little boy's question lingers and
I am suddenly naked



[Poem #29 for National Poetry month! www.donrearden.com  ]

Blue Berry Blue

Blue Berry Blue

a white Styrofoam™ cup
filled to the rim with tundra
blue berries
just picked, the skin
of each a light soft blue,
and just beneath the surface
a deeper blue, a darkness

not unlike the bruises
often found on the very
Alaskan women who pick
these sweet berries
their numbers, like the contents
in the cup, beyond count

and our leaders argue over the oil
focused only on filling the pipeline
with the darkness
needed to manufacture the cup
and they continue
to ignore the contents



[DAY 5 --- of my poem a day for National Poetry month.]

Musk-Ox Stew and Mexican Beer

Ablaze along the Bering Sea Coast Photo by Seth Kantner

 Musk-Ox Stew, Mexican Beer


we made camp at the edge of the earth
amid the white bones of a whale
and the grey skeleton of an old skiff 

we collected driftwood, set ablaze with dried moss
and maybe a splash of dinosaur
wolfed down the fire warmed muskox stew
in gloved hands, sipped half slushed Tecate,
cut slices of lime with a Leatherman

the cold war sun slipped beneath the sea
a submarine bound for the gulags,

a frigid black sky followed
we gathered more sticks, more moss
hunched closer to the blaze
surrounded by waves, wind, and bears

We told stories, laughed, and spoke of nothing
and everything

as if this had always been
and would always be

then like gasoline on water,
the colors slid across the surface of the sky
ignited, and bathed the edge of the earth
in the icy light of Aurora's warmth



[This is Day 2 --- of my marathon Poem a Day for National Poetry Month.]