Seal Oil Salesman

A good friend's jar of seal oil.

Seal Oil Salesman


Step right up and dip your:

Salmon! Pike! Whitefish! Blackfish!
Lushfish! Halibut!

For all fish:
Dried, smoked, baked, frozen,
fermented, and raw!

Ingest for:
Stomach ache! Constipation! Diarrhea!
Body aches, cold, flu, general malaise!

For Eskimo Ice-Cream mix with:
A splash of boiling water, Crisco,
whip with your bare hand
add sugar
salmon berries, blue berries, and crow!

Rub on:
Frost bite, burns, sore joints!
Cheeks! Lips! Wounds!

Use for:
Waterproofing, lubrication, softening!
Heat, light, and warmth!

Does not:
emit carbon, pollute, cause wars

Does not:
ruin beaches, rivers, lakes, oceans

Does not:
cause cancer, greed, avarice

Does not:
require pipelines, drilling, corruption





[This poem was picked up by public radio and read over the air on Bethel's awesome radio station, KYUK, by Shane Iverson. You can hear the poem, complete with perfect background music, here! ]

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.]