Sublime

you will have survived starvation and relocation, indoctrination and assimilation,

Stray bullets and consequences are landing on our unsuspecting bodies even now.

the woman inside impatiently waves Opal across like she’s doing all of humanity a favor.

Our names are poems, descriptions of animals, images that make perfect sense and no sense at all. We are Little Cloud, Littleman, Loneman, Bull Coming, Madbull, Bad Heart Bull, Jumping Bull, Bird, Birdshead, Kingbird, Magpie, Eagle, Turtle,

We will wrap him in bright colors. I do not know the ways of our people. I was too young when they took me, and then the school meant to make what I knew a sin. Everything I have left to share, to pass down to you will have to be good enough. All I have to tell you about being Cheyenne came from my mother, before she died, and because she was dying

Being Indian has never been about returning to the land. The land is everywhere or nowhere.

It’s a secret she holds so tight to her chest she never notices it.

It’s been years since everyone wore masks everywhere, years since the Spanish flu. He realized he preferred to cover his face. He hates his face. The freckles. Despises them. They look like mistakes. They are from his mother. His aquiline nose and round face are from his father. He can more easily pass for white with a mask on. He was wearing a mas

You were both and neither.