Notes About The Poem
1484 (1,484th contest sponsored by Brian) Poetry Contest
Sponsor Brian Strand
8th Place
Teepee art by Colt Idol
Autumnal Teepees Art Print by Joseph Henry Sharp
The smoking mirror of truth shall not hide, walk with eyes wide, with pride, you’re not forgotten —Poetess
Yiya—Cherokee for Grandma
Our Teepee, Our Home
Yiya was rest assured
a promising home, she had kept chary
hers a river teepee a breathing beast,
smoke flaps exhaling atop
warmed by fire burned low
hides of heliotrope hues aglow
animated painted horse and buffalo,
reincarnated shadowed figures
dancing to crackling embers
at start of every sundown
cooled in simmer summer
dry of sombrous rain runoff
trickling down a conical roof
her traditions evoked in ceremonials
coming of age, death, birth, Mother Earth
drum circles, collective heartbeats
sharing bean bread, three sisters, wild greens
connection, belonging
holding on ‘til the folding of time
torn from all she knew,
she is fused within tribes
pathfinder scorn to swamps
her moccasins worn thin by every hardship,
her spirit snagged through mud,
through icy terrain, through wilderness
stained by the weight of each step
bearing, carrying her forward
what had once been soft and whole
now bore the marks of survival,
proof the path had tried to break, yet failed
frailer, flailed beneath a strawberry moon,
frayed edges become less a sign,
ruinous of a quiet testament of endurance
seekers of unknown lowlands and lowly creatures
brutal summits, known as t h e
T
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o
f
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s
they fall with each turn each twist
of her bruised body
gash and fist, resist, resist
shed are fears,
resilient are broken dreams
salt sweat dripping,
rippling rivers of betrayals
tears of brooding beads frozen
Great Spirit hear her cries
through howling winds,
grueling are the spiky pines
nativized settlers ride along
an arduous journey,
‘escorts of prosecution’
starved crass riverbends
clogged with ice, shards
carved into bled hearts
her existence impermissible
bleak harling horizons
beyond unbaled wilderness
caws of carrion vultures swarm
calling the darkening sky
agony on the path of exile
the tour of trespassers
her nature and character
changed forevermore
her promises broken
in a distant land of the banished,
she had vanished
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