Dancing Bear

Stumbling Into Scotty’s Looking To Shoot Arrows



on the juke box, Ministry
(not the whimpy disco stuff)
bluesilver smoke clouds
five lanes -three open   
Old Peculiar in stock
and me in arrow heaven
I assemble my set
with marksman’s care and respect
players  -- good players -- are watching me
to see how I treat my darts

I throw threes, ones and fives
so the gallery knows I know
what I am doing  -
wannabes and marks will think I’m easy   
(and it will cost them)

Challengers come (they always do)
"diddle for the middle"
I lose it so he calls Cricket 
throwing his two fast twenties
and a five
at the line bending my knees a bit
staring at the board
still hearing the gritty grumbly 
the three packs five pints a day
voice of the shark/master who taught me   
As with every master I learned from  
I honor their attempt to tutor me
tonight, the master would be proud
In this moment, I am everything
pin-point on the board, dart, spinning flight, 
American Spirit cig tucked behind my ear, 
my steady guide-finger, molecules of smoke, 
of oxygen, smirking smug know-it-all challenger, 
juke box blaring out psalms 69 -- "praise Jesus",
Billy Barkeep’s silvering hair,
a pint of Guiness still settling

the perfect flight released from my finger
single twenty, dead center, 
a sloppy one for drama 
-- don’t want to look too good, 
triple twenty for clean up
my opponent concentrates on the sloppy one
making my triple look lucky
I play a couple steps ahead of him
play him close, play him tight
shut him out of each number
even bulls are just much of the same
Then he wants to partner up
go after the others, being how
he and I are so evenly close and all
-- smart lad
We win our way through 501
301 and more Cricket 
Tonight I drink for free
tonight we are closers
all 2am lost 
in Friday morning fog
not a real winner amongst us

Fake Kachina



The real kachinas are aware
watching you
waiting 

They have seen the abomination
the commercial kachina
made by  hands not blessed for the making
When you are not the people
when the people never invite your
heavy handed stealing
when their culture has been raped
and peddled and whittled to a marketing line
when sluggish wield the sacred images
like a blunt tool
then kachinas come

angry

You visit their homes
feed from the electric energy 
and you think one came to you
What conceit 
You are without heart
evil black spirit
You steal images from cultures
that you think cannot notice it
the way you bend and break the sacred
Cannot feel the cold contempt
and condemnation you have for their people
Yes, kachinas are coming

to purify
to clean what you have fouled

A kachina is a beautiful image
it is a stone in the river
not to be taken out, tumbled and polished
even a child can tell an imitation of a stone
You are not a kachina
You do not respect what you are not
You are a vile loathsome shade
The kachinas accuse you
the kachinas are coming

to save the people’s image

The kachina will come to the tall man made mesa
the one you call home
turn you grain
foul your water
convince the earth that you do not respect her
spread fire to the things you touch
water on the rest of your world
the kachinas will not provide comfort for you
the earth will not provide life for you
Leave this world
unwelcomed
Your death an obscurity

And when you are dead 
I have a knife to do what needs doing
to ensure your evil spirit will never return

Dog Soldier



1.
promised to Death
spending his life
waiting for his bride

2.
Here is where I die
should my fate be dying
Here is where I stand
sacred arrow impaling my dog sash 
driven into the ground
where the Mother whispers it
sash around my waist
connected to the Earth
I feel power 
in my black and white face
feathers filled with wind
I wait
wait in Death’s painted face
wait in heart beats
wait in breaths

3.
Death on a taunt string
under a lizard sun
in buffalo grass
muscles tense
glistening fearless sweat

4.
No enemy shall pass
No enemy shall 
No enemy 
without my blood stains
without tasting my steel
without spending strength

5.
The warrior dog

loyalty – skin and clay
devotion – heart and stone
duty – bone and water
honor – blood and snow


6.
Million shadows running in tall grass
spirits of foxes watching
panting anxiety into spaces
spaces between the reeds
their hearts beating crazy rhythms in my head
their reflexes twitch my muscles

I am grinning through blood

7.
Red war shirt
bloody lance 
I sing a very old song
Death rides up to greet me

Teffies



Your tongue has been cut loose
flapping ugliness into the wind
coloring the air black
like oil flowing 
over the shore
crippling that which has not been
killed
You cannot take it back
or white wash this destruction
Like an Exxon lawyer
you want me to believe
that the coastline allowed itself
to be destroyed
or was at fault
after all
it is the coastlines that
rip holes in tankers
So all your victims of 
colors, race, religion, gender and preference
must be responsible for
keeping your mouth shut
or better yet
evolve to possess Teflon skin
so they may sit in the "Teflon Only"
section and drink from the same labeled
drinking fountains
Your black heart dreams
of little nicknames to call them
perhaps "Teffies" or
"Flons"
so as to accentuate the differences
between you and them
in an effort to gain support
from the few left who 
hate like you do
alone and clinging together
-the weak skinned ones