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The priest approached the grave slowly, wondering how they had managed to dig into the frozen ground; and then he remembered that this was New Mexico, and saw the pile of cold loose sand beside the hole. The people stood close to each other with little clouds of steam puffing from their faces. The priest looked at them and saw a pile of jackets, gloves, and scarves in the yellow, dry tumbleweeds that grew in the graveyard. He looked at the red blanket, not sure that Teofilo was so small, wondering if it wasn’t some perverse Indian trick—something they did in March to ensure a good harvest—wondering if maybe old Teofilo was actually at sheep camp corraling the sheep for the night. But there he was, facing into a cold dry wind and squinting at the last sunlight, ready to bury a red wool blanket while the faces of his parishioners were in shadow with the last warmth of the sun on their backs.

  His fingers were stiff, and it took him a long time to twist the lid off the holy water. Drops of water fell on the red blanket and soaked into dark icy spots. He sprinkled the grave and the water disappeared almost before it touched the dim, cold sand; it reminded him of something—he tried to remember what it was, because he thought if he could remember he might understand this. He sprinkled more water; he shook the container until it was empty, and the water fell through the light from sundown like August rain that fell while the sun was still shining, almost evaporating before it touched the wilted squash flowers.

  The wind pulled at the priest’s brown Franciscan robe and swirled away the corn meal and pollen that had been sprinkled on the blanket. They lowered the bundle into the ground, and they didn’t bother to untie the stiff pieces of new rope that were tied around the ends of the blanket. The sun was gone, and over on the highway the eastbound lane was full of headlights. The priest walked away slowly. Leon watched him climb the hill, and when he had disappeared within the tall, thick walls, Leon turned to look up at the high blue mountains in the deep snow that reflected a faint red light from the west. He felt good because it was finished, and he was happy about the sprinkling of the holy water; now the old man could send them big thunderclouds for sure.

  Grandpa Hank

  Many of the Navajo people would come back to the same houses year after year for Laguna Feast until finally they were good friends with the Laguna families and they would bring nice gifts when they came. Grandpa Hank had a friend like that, an old man from Alamo. Every year they were so glad to see each other, and the Navajo man would bring Grandpa something in the gunny sack he carried—sometimes little apricots the old man grew or a mutton shoulder. Grandpa would walk around the store and gather up things for his friend—coffee and sugar and a new pair of Levi’s—things like that. I remember the last time the old Navajo man came looking for my grandpa. He came into the store and looked for Grandpa where Grandpa always stood, behind his desk in the corner. When he didn’t see him, the old man asked for him and then we told him, “Henry passed away last winter.” The old Navajo man cried, and then he left. He never came back anymore after that.

  Deer Dance / For Your Return

  for Denny

  If this

  will hasten your return

  then I will hold myself above you all night

  blowing softly

  down-feathered clouds

  that drift above the spruce

  and hide your eyes

  as you are born back

  to the mountain.

  Years ago

  through the yellow oak leaves

  antlers polished like stones

  in the canyon stream-crossing

  Morning turned in the sky

  when I saw you

  and I wanted the gift

  you carry on moon-color shoulders

  so big

  the size of you

  holds the long winter.

  You have come home with me before

  a long way down the mountain

  The people welcome you.

  I took

  the best red blanket for you

  the turquoise the silver rings

  were very old

  something familiar for you

  blue corn meal saved special.

  While others are sleeping

  I tie feathers on antlers

  whisper close to you

  we have missed you

  I have longed for you.

  Losses are certain

  in the pattern of this dance

  Over the terrain a hunter travels

  blind curves in the trail

  seize the breath

  until it leaps away

  loose again

  to run the hills.

  Go quickly.

  How beautiful

  this last time

  I touch you

  to believe

  and hasten the return

  of lava-slope hills and

  your next-year heart

  Mine still beats

  in the tall grass

  where you stopped.

  Go quickly.

  Year by year

  after the first snowfall

  I will walk these hills and

  pray you will come again

  I will go with a heart full for you

  to wait your return.

  The neck pulse slacks,

  then smoothes.

  It has been a long time

  Sundown forms change

  Faces are unfamiliar

  As the last warmth goes

  from under my hand

  Hooves scatter rocks

  down the hillside

  and I turn to you

  The run

  for the length of the mountain

  is only beginning.

  In the fall, the Laguna hunters go to the hills and mountains around Laguna Pueblo to bring back the deer. The people think of the deer as coming to give themselves to the hunters so that the people will have meat through the winter. Late in the winter the Deer Dance is performed to honor and pay thanks to the deer spirits who’ve come home with the hunters that year. Only when this has been properly done will the spirits be able to return to the mountain and be reborn into more deer who will, remembering the reverence and appreciation of the people, once more come home with the hunters.

  Grandpa graduated from Sherman Institute, an Indian School located in Riverside, California. While he was at Sherman he became fascinated with engineering and design and wanted to become an automobile designer. But in 1912 Indian schools were strictly vocational schools and the teachers at Sherman told Grandpa that Indians didn’t become automobile designers. So when Grandpa Hank came home from Sherman he had been trained to be a store clerk.

  He went to work in Abie Abraham’s store at Laguna and eventually saved up enough to open a little store of his own after he and Grandma Lillie were married. He never cared much for storekeeping; he just did what had to be done. When I got older I was aware of how quiet he was sometimes and sensed there was some sadness he never identified.

  He subscribed to Motor Trend and Popular Mechanics and followed the new car designs and results of road tests each year. In 1957 when Ford brought out the Thunderbird in a hardtop convertible, Grandpa Hank bought one and that was his car until he died.

  Grandpa Hank and his 1933 Auburn

  A Hunting Story

  for my grandpa, H. C. Marmon

  You have

  my grandfather’s feet

  light brown

  smooth with the years

  he’s been gone.

  Your hands are familiar

  like the moonlight

  on December snow

  only sometimes,

  I don’t recognize

  the sandstone cliff

  behind you.

  All night

  your eyes

  something burns dark

  in old juniper trees.

  the she-owl

  echoes

  along the cliff.

  The stars

  pull the sky down with them.

&n
bsp; I smooth your belly

  with my hand

  round and round

  We whisper

  precise wet sand

  spreading wide

  down the Pacific Coast.

  I knelt above you

  that morning

  I counted the rattles

  the last whistles

  in your throat.

  I put my mouth on yours.

  It might have been possible then

  except you clenched your teeth

  I could not push through

  with my breath or my fingers.

  I saw how you would go

  spilling out

  between ivory ribs

  seeping under the tall gate

  where earth sucked you in

  like rainwater.

  I couldn’t stop you—

  fragile dust

  sparks of sunlight

  dispersing

  into

  horses of many colors

  stony gray

  blue steeldust

  pink mesa stone

  the yellow buckskin

  leaping out of the east—

  You scattered in all directions

  of the winds.

  Your wife and sons

  burned your jacket

  sold your car

  They stood

  holding their own fingers.

  There was a song

  you never sang to me

  the same way

  you’d never been to Zuni

  not in all those years

  of Arkansas, Santa Fe and Colorado.

  There was a dance

  sweetheart

  you never came

  to take me home

  But when I hold fingers

  they will be yours.

  If I could see you clearly

  only once

  If I could come upon you

  parked in your truck

  sleeping in juniper trees

  by Otter lake

  Then we could gather

  fluttering darkfeathered dreams

  before they startle

  before they fly far away.

  The big star is Polaris

  and we hunt for you.

  Around smoky campfires

  of First Night

  where Navajo women

  feed you mutton

  and tell you

  you are from the mountains

  above Fluted Rock.

  All night

  I track sudden sounds

  that crack

  through moonlight thickets.

  Up ahead

  there is a small clearing

  When you step out

  into sight

  I will be waiting.

  Grandpa Hank had grown up mostly at Paguate

  with his Grandma and Grandpa Anaya

  although his parents

  lived at Laguna.

  He used to drive an old wagon between Laguna and Paguate

  and he used to pretend it was a fancy buggy

  one of those light fast buggies.

  Later on my great-grandpa bought a buggy

  and it was Grandpa Hank’s job

  to drive tourists around the Laguna-Acoma area.

  Grandpa Hank said

  mostly the tourists came to see Acoma

  the “Sky City” which was already famous then.

  In 1908 when the Smithsonian Institution

  excavated the top of Katsi’ma, Enchanted Mesa

  Grandpa drove some of the archeologists

  out there in his buggy.

  The archeologists used a small brass cannon

  to shoot a line over the top of Enchanted Mesa

  so they could rig a crude elevator.

  I asked Grandpa

  what the archeologists found up there—

  I had always been curious about what might be

  on top of Enchanted Mesa.

  “Did they find the bones of that old blind lady

  and that baby,” I asked him

  “You know, the ones they tell about in that old story?”

  There is an old story about a blind woman

  being stranded on top of enchanted mesa with a tiny baby

  the time the sandstone trail to the top collapsed.

  “I didn’t see any bones,”

  Grandpa Hank said,

  but those Smithsonian people were putting everything

  into wooden boxes as fast as they could.

  They took everything with them

  in those wooden boxes

  back to Washington D.C.”

  Then Grandpa said

  “You know

  probably all those boxes of things

  they took from Enchanted Mesa

  are still just sitting somewhere

  in the basement of some museum.”

  Where Mountain Lion Lay Down with Deer

  I climb the black rock mountain

  stepping from day to day.

  silently.

  I smell the wind for my ancestors

  pale blue leaves

  crushed wild mountain smell.

  Returning

  up the gray stone cliff

  where I descended

  a thousand years ago

  Returning to faded black stone

  where mountain lion lay down with deer.

  It is better to stay up here

  watching wind’s reflection

  in tall yellow flowers.

  The old ones who remember me are gone

  the old songs are all forgotten

  and the story of my birth.

  How I danced in snow-frost moonlight

  distant stars to the end of the Earth,

  How I swam away

  in freezing mountain water

  narrow mossy canyon tumbling down

  out of the mountain

  out of deep canyon stone

  down

  the memory

  spilling out

  into the world.

  Deer Song

  Storm winds carry snow

  to the mountain stream

  clotted white in silence,

  pale blue streak under ice

  to the sea.

  The ice shatters into glassy

  bone splinters that tear deep into

  soft parts of the hoof.

  Swimming away from the wolves

  before dawn

  choking back salt water

  the steaming red froth tide.

  It is necessary.

  Reflections that blind

  from a thousand feet of

  gray schist

  snow-covered in dying winter sunlight.

  The pain is numbed by the freezing,

  the depths of the night sky,

  the distance beyond pale stars.

  Do not think that I do not love you

  if I scream

  while I die.

  Antler and thin black hoof

  smashed against dark rock—

  the struggle is the ritual

  shining teeth tangled in

  sinew and flesh.

  You see,

  I will go with you,

  Because you call softly

  because you are my brother

  and my sister

  Because the mountain is

  our mother.

  I will go with you

  because you love me

  while I die.

  At Laguna Feast time, Navajos used to jam the hillsides with their wagons and horses. As a child I watched them arrive. They braided red and blue and yellow yarn tassles into the horses’ manes and tails, and they decorated their wagons. They came because years ago the Lagunas invited them to come and eat all they wanted at any house. After four or five days they’d go, loaded with gifts from Laguna—corn, melons, squash. Gradually, the wagons were fewer and fewer, replaced by old beat-up cars and trucks. My father made all of us k
ids come outside and watch the last wagon come. It came two years by itself and then no more.

  Preparations

  Dead sheep

  beside the highway.

  Belly burst open

  guts and life unwinding on the sand.

  The body is carefully attended.

  Look at the long black wings

  the shining eyes

  Solemn and fat the crows gather

  to make preparations.

  Pull wool from skin

  Pick meat from bone

  tendon from muscle.

  Only a few more days

  they say to each other

  A few more days and this will be finished.

  Bones, bones

  Let wind polish the bones.

  It is done.

  Story from Bear Country

  You will know

  when you walk

  in bear country

  By the silence

  flowing swiftly between the juniper trees

  by the sundown colors of sandrock

  all around you.

  You may smell damp earth

  scratched away

  from yucca roots

  You may hear snorts and growls

  slow and massive sounds

  from caves

  in the cliffs high above you.

  It is difficult to explain

  how they call you

  All but a few who went to them

  left behind families

  grandparents

  and sons

  a good life.

  The problem is

  you will never want to return

  Their beauty will overcome your memory

  like winter sun

  melting ice shadows from snow

  And you will remain with them

  locked forever inside yourself

  your eyes will see you

  dark shaggy and thick.

  We can send bear priests

  loping after you

  their medicine bags

  bouncing against their chests

  Naked legs painted black

  bear claw necklaces

  rattling against

  their capes of blue spruce.