1.
He sits.
His brain
hypertrophied,
exploded
into a gray mist. Owl feathers cloud
twin buffalo horns.
I sit on his left.
set on the buffalo hide rug.
boots off the rug.
My body is a right angle.
2.
I listen.
spewing beatnik rubbish.
To the wasichu, the white fat-taker, religion is for Sunday.
To the Sioux, everything is religion.
I think of penguins and Sunday school.
The tipi is our church. The buffalo skill in front of me is the altar.
The buffalo and the Sioux are one.
I lean back,
rest on my elbow.
On half of the skull are red dots, representing the sky people.
On half of the skull are black dots, representing the living.
The skull is stuffed with purifying sweetgrass.
The buffalo hide rug is comfortable:
It accepts me.
The pipe is the most sacred of a man's possessions. When the stem and bowl are separated, the pipe is an object. When they are joined, the pipe is holy.
He smokes.
The stem is wood, representing the earth.
The bowl
is red pipestone, representing man.
He offers the pipe
to one of the four directions
before each puff.
3.
I take the pipe in both hands.
It isn't heavy.
It isn't light.
I offer the pipe to the East,
where the sun enters
the tipi's round door.
I puff. The smoke of tobacco
and red willow inner bark
fills my mouth
like my first food after a long fast.
I exhale and float with the smoke
out of the tipi.
I graze in a field of sweet grass.
I am a buffalo.
A chert arrow pops my lung.
I fall.
A man, a man looking chiseled from pipestone,
prays over me.
He thanks me for giving him life.
He removes my hide.
He reveals a man.
I lie in a field of sweetgrass.
I am my great-grandfather
in his cavalry uniform.
An Indian stands over me.
I am frightened.
I try to hide the tobacco pouch
that is in my hand:
It was made from a Sioux's scrotum.
The Indian raises a feathered stick
and brings it down.
He taps me on my shoulder,
counts coup.
I am disgraced.
4.
I stand an walk
to the tipi's door.
I turn to the holy man and say,
The sun never shone as brightly as on the day of our meeting.
He smiles.
I walk out of the tipi
and bump into a fat wasichu
with a camera slung around his neck.
He swears at me.
I walk away.
He tells his wife,
"Probably drunk.
They're always drunk."
