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Sebayik *At the edge where the sea kisses the landIndians fished for pollack with bare hands. So many fish the waters turned black tails flapping, they said. Now Sebayik Indians eat "not to be sold" cheese and macaroni Old ladies walk the highway picking up cans a nickle a can for bingo money brings promises of hitting the jackpot. The priest walks house to house eating his way to heaven doling out penances to those who will get on their knees and Molly Neptune walks her granddaughter to the clinic everyone to see, mother to be at age thirteen. Then foggy salt air lifts to a luminous sunrise sea smoke's ethereal mist transforms the long lean winter into a dream of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, blackberries summer's ripe berries galore. The finback whales return to Passamaquoddy Bay and they sing their primordial song as we pick sweetgrass there the fresh and salt waters meet. Returning home we throw the roots to Chibesquiog* to plant themselves for the next generation of basketmakers. At Sebayik men are still men for the women who love them and their children wait for the pollack's return. * Sebayik (see buy ik): Passamaquoddy word for at the edge and the Pleasant Point Reservation, Perry, Maine * Chibesquiog (Chi bes qui og): the swamp |
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Issue #25, February, 2002 :
Santa Fe Poetry Broadside.