Okay, I HAD to include a second poem by Tlingit/Haida/Yup’ik/Sami poet X’unei Lance Twitchell from G̱agaan X̱ʼusyee / Below the Foot of the Sun | University Press of Colorado Open Books.

If Only in Dreams

by X’unei Lance Twitchell

In youth I could fly
away from the hills of turmoil
and caress the motion of the wind
with a grace that left my world behind.

Then there was that discussion
which I had dreamt before,
and I tore into my mind to find
the forgotten words
that may have predicted suicide.

And finally, last night,
a relative tossed pictures
to the earth and spoke
in a language to which
I am an infant and
her words were clear to me.