IN SUMMER

IN SUMMER
Page
 
Today 105
 
Packing 106
 
Goodbye To My Hogan 107
 
Goodbye 108
 
Ready To Go 109
 
Goodbye Gray Cat 110
 
Across the Sand 111
 
Goodbye To Grandmother 112
 
Riding 113
 
Noon in the Sagebrush 114
 
Night Camp 115
 
Up the Trail 116
 
Summer Range 117
 
The Lake 118
 
Shelter 119
 
The Sheep Corral 120
 
Dawn 121
 
Morning Prayer 123
 
The Sheep 124
 
The Goats 126
 
Herding 127
 
Noon on the Mesa 130
 
Afternoon 131
 
Playmates 132
 
Possessions 134
 
Storm 135
 
Lightning 136
 
Fire 137
 
Rain 138
 
Evening 139
 
Supper 141
 
Talking 143
 
Sheep Dipping 145
 
Bedtime 146
 
The Star Song 147
 
The Artist 149

TODAY

Today
we leave my mother's hogan
my mother's winter hogan.
We leave the shelter of its
rounded walls.
We leave its friendly center fire.
We drive our sheep to the mountains.
For the sheep,
there is grass and shade
and water,
flowing water
and water standing still,
in the mountains.
There is no wind.
There is no sand
up there.

PACKING

My mother's possessions
we tie on the pack horses,
her loom parts
and her wool yarns,
her cooking pots,
her blanket
and my blanket
and the water jug,
white sacks filled with food,
cans of food,
cornmeal and wheat flour,
coffee and sugar.
My mother's possessions,
we tie them all on the
pack horses.
The packs must be steady.
The ropes must be tight.
The knots must be strong.
I cannot pack the horses,
I am too little,
but I can bring the possessions
to my father and my uncle.
I am big enough for that.

GOODBYE TO MY HOGAN

My mother's hogan,
I feel safe
with your rounded walls
about me.
But now I must leave you.
I must leave your fire
and your door.
The sheep need me.
I must go with them
to a place they know,
but that is strange to me.
I put my moccasins,
my precious moccasins,
by your fireplace, my hogan,
so you will not be lonely
while I am gone.

GOODBYE

Land
around my mother's hogan
and sheep trail
and arroyo
and waterhole,
sleep in the sun
this summer.
Rest well
for my sheep
will not be here
to deepen the trail and arroyo
with their little sharp feet.
They will not be here
to eat the short grass,
to drink the stored water.
Sleep,
rest well,
and be ready for our return.

READY TO GO

My mother scatters the ashes
from her cooking fire.
She sweeps the hogan floor
with her rabbit-brush broom.
My father lays the bough
across the door
to show that we have gone.
The dogs bark.
They run around the sheep corral
telling the sheep
we are ready to go.
The young corn in the field
hangs its tasseled heads.
Young corn,
my grandmother is staying
at home.
She will take care of you.
My father mounts his horse.
He drives the pack horses before him.
My uncle mounts his horse.
They ride away together,
singing,
across the empty sand.

GOODBYE GRAY CAT

Gray Cat,
I am telling you goodbye.
Today I go to the mountains.
I take my sheep to summer range,
but you, Gray Cat,
you have no sheep
so you must stay at home.
Stay here with my grandmother,
Gray Cat.
She will feed you.
Goodbye, Goodbye.

ACROSS THE SAND

My mother lets down the bars
of the sheep corral.
The flock crowds around her.
The goats look at me.
I think they are saying,
"We know where we are going."
The little lambs
walk close by their mothers.
They are like me,
they do not know
if they will like this place
where we are going.
My mother and I,
we drive our sheep
across the sand.
My grandmother
stands at her door
looking after us.

GOODBYE TO GRANDMOTHER

My grandmother,
my little grandmother,
now I am leaving you.
Last year I was too small
to go to the mountains.
I stayed with you,
but this year I am big,
I am almost tall
so I must help drive the sheep
to summer range.
My grandmother,
my little grandmother,
do not be lonely.
I will come back again.

RIDING

Riding,
riding,
riding on my horse
to herd the sheep
across the yellow sand.
Yellow sand is around me.
Yellow sun is above me.
I ride in the middle
of a sand and sun filled world.
Riding,
riding,
riding on my horse
to herd the sheep
across the yellow sand.
Sun heat
and sheep smell
and sand dust
wrap around me
like a blanket
as I ride through the sand
with my sheep.

NOON IN THE SAGEBRUSH

At noon
we reach the sagebrush flats.
Gray-green sagebrush scents the air.
Gray-green sagebrush softens
the yellows of the land.
My mother makes a little fire
no bigger than her coffee pot.
Food is good
and rest is good
at noon
in the sagebrush.

NIGHT CAMP

At night we make camp
in the juniper covered hills.
My father is waiting for us there.
The moon looks down
on the restless sheep
on the hobbled horses.
The moon looks down
on a shooting star.
But I am too tired
to look at anything.
I sleep.

UP THE TRAIL

Morning sunrise sees us climbing
up and up
on the mountain trail.
There are pine trees
standing straight and tall.
Brown pine needles
and green grass
cover the ground.
Shadows play with the sunlight.
There is no yellow sand.
The sheep hurry upward,
climbing and pushing
in the narrow trail.
I ride after the sheep.
My horse breathes fast.
His feet stumble
in the narrow trail.
All day long
the sheep climb upward.
They want to eat
and I am hungry, too,
but my mother says,
"No."
All day long we ride
to herd the sheep.
Night is almost with us
when we reach the top.

SUMMER RANGE

Summer range in the mountains
is on a high mesa,
a steep, high mesa,
a flat-topped mesa,
with tall growing pine trees,
with short growing green grass,
with little, winding rivers
and rain filled lakes.
This is summer range for our sheep.

THE LAKE

Between the trees
I see water standing
in a bowl of green rushes.
The water is quiet.
It is still
and blue
and cold.
It is a lake
with land all around it.
It is a lake.
The sheep drink
long and steadily.
They stand in the shallow water
at the edges of the lake.
Their little pointed feet
dig deep into the mud
of the lake banks.
I see colored fish
beneath the water
swimming in a rainbow line.
I throw stones into the lake.
The water pushes back in circles
to take the stones.
The dogs swim far out
into the cold waters.
They are thirsty and hot.
I have never seen a lake before.
Gentle rain pools I have seen
and angry flood waters,
but never before
a still, blue lake.
It is beautiful.
A lake is beautiful.

SHELTER

Beneath the trees
I see our summer shelter.
My father and my uncle
have made a shade
to shelter us from night rains
and from the cold
of near-by snow peaks.
They have made us a shade
of cottonwood boughs
and juniper bark.
It has the clean smell
that trees give.

THE SHEEP CORRAL

My father and my uncle
made a sheep corral
while they were waiting
for the sheep and for us
to come up the trail.
They made the sheep corral
of branches,
a circle of branches,
a circle of dark colored boughs.
The sheep stay safe
in their corral tonight
and I sleep
beneath the cottonwood shade.

DAWN

This morning
when I opened my eyes from
sleeping I could not remember
what place this is.
I thought I was in
my mother's winter hogan.
Now I remember.
This is summer camp.
Tall trees stretch above me.
In the darkness
they look blacker than the night.
As I lie here,
safe and warm beneath
my blanket,
all around me turns to gray mist,
all around me turns to silver.
Darkness is gone,
but it made no sound.
It left no footprints.
The world is still asleep.
Through the pine trees
day comes up
light comes up.
In the pine trees
bird wings are stirring,
bird songs are stirring.
I hear them.
I hear them.
The grass beside my blanket
is wet with night rain.
Morning mist is on the leaves
and in my hair.
I put one toe out,
one brown toe out.
It is hard to get up
when it is cold.
Blue smoke from my mother's fire
curls upward in a thin blue line.
The sheep move inside their corral.
I come out from under my blanket,
from under my warm blanket.
Like the other things around me,
I come out
to greet the day.

MORNING PRAYER

Silent and still
my father stands
before our summer shelter.
He is thinking a prayer
to the Holy Ones,
asking them
this day
to keep our feet
on the trail of Beauty.
Filling the silence
of my father's prayer
I hear the bluebird's song.

THE SHEEP

The poor sheep are cold.
Their winter wool was cut off
last week
at shearing time.
When early summer painted
flowers on the desert
with bunches of new grass,
when snow water melted
and softened the hard earth,
when Sun-Bearer smiled
on the sheep and the people.
Then my mother said,
"Now,
it is shearing time."
My mother said that last week.
Last week it was shearing time.
Last week
at shearing time,
my mother caught her sheep.
One by one she caught them.
She tied their feet together
and with her shears
she clipped their wool.
My mother's hands were sure.
She cut the wool but once
from underneath.
She did not fumble,
cutting it here and there
into short pieces.
She cut the wool but once.
Her hands were sure.
My mother's hands were strong.
She pulled the wool back.
She folded it back
to come off in one piece.
My mother's hands were strong.
The sheep lay still
beneath her gentle fingers.
Trusting my mother's hands,
the sheep lay still.
But now
the poor sheep are cold.
They stand in their corral
this morning
and shiver
and bleat
and call loudly
for the sun
and for me
to come.

THE GOATS

Goats lead the sheep.
They go first into everything.
That is their way.
They are not afraid.
My uncle says in the English,
"Goats are tough."
Goats eat the grass too far down.
They eat the trees too far up.
That is their way.
They do not care.
My uncle says in the English,
"Goats are tough."
Goats, more than sheep,
get into my mother's stew pot.
Their meat is good,
but it takes chewing,
too much chewing.
I say with my uncle,
"Goats are tough."

HERDING

After we have eaten our morning food,
my father and my uncle
ride down the steep trail
to the Trading Post.
My mother kneels beside her loom
before the cottonwood shade.
I see the sun on my mother's
brown hands.
I see the sun on my mother's
black hair.
I give my mother a long look,
then I turn my back.
I walk to the sheep corral.
My feet are brown.
My feet are bare.
The wet grass parts
to make a way
to let me pass.
I walk to the sheep corral.
My skirts are long.
My skirts are many.
The flowers move back
to make a way
to let me pass.
I walk to the sheep corral.
I let down the bars.
The sheep go first
and I follow.
The sheep walk slowly
for they like to eat
the short sweet grass
under the trees.
I walk slowly
for I am lonely.
Things here are strange.
I am afraid.
I know that my mother sits
before our shelter
weaving a blanket at her loom.
I know she is near me,
but I cannot see her.
I can see only tall trees
and bits of sky.
I am a child of the yellow sand.
Mesa top and pine trees,
green grass and colored flowers
are strange to me.
Unknown things live here.
I am afraid.
I creep to the edge of the mesa
while my sheep are feeding.
Far, far below me
is the world I know,
the yellow world
of sand and wind
and sand.
Far below
I see sheep walking,
someone's sheep walking,
in a dust cloud
of their own making.
Far below
I see a sand whirl
made by an angry wind
fighting the land.
Far below
I see the heat haze,
colored heat haze
blanketing the desert.
I see these things
through tears
for they are the things
I know.
I am lonely without them.
Here on top of the mesa
is a strange world
of shadows and water
and grass for the sheep.
Grass for the sheep,
I had forgotten that.
Grass for the sheep
to give them life,
to make them strong.
Here on top of the mesa
there is grass for our sheep.
Surely the gods are good
who live here.
The sheep drink slowly.
Shadows sleep.
The quiet of the mesa
pushes against me.
I can feel it, heavy, heavy,
it pushes against me.
Surely, the gods who live here
are known to me.
The words of the Holy Song
are known to me.
"On top of the mountain
are found the gods."
These are the words
of the Holy Song.

NOON ON THE MESA

Day grows long
and bright with sunlight.
The sheep eat their way
to the rain lakes
under the willows.
Little rivers run through the tall grass
and hide away in the rushes.
I see a line of scattered clouds
across the sky.
Sun-Bearer rests
on his way
to the House of Turquoise Woman
in the Western Waters.
It is the middle-time of day.

AFTERNOON

Lying on my back
under the willows
I can see an eagle flying
far above
in great circles
against the blue.
I feel
and see
and listen,
but I do not talk.
There is no one to hear me.
There is no one to play with me,
only the lambs and the baby goats
and they like each other
better than me,
I think.
I am alone.

PLAYMATES

But look!!
There are butterflies,
small white butterflies
above the flower plants
of purple iris.
I sit among the iris.
I hear the whispering
of white wings flying.
I think they like my velvet blouse.
I think they like my long black hair
because they come to me
and to the purple iris,
those small white butterflies.
A little fat chipmunk
in a brown striped blanket
comes close to me.
He sits on his feet.
He holds his hands out.
He wrinkles his nose and looks at me.
I give him bread.
He holds it in his hands
and with little quick bites
stores it away
in his fat brown cheeks.
Funny little chipmunk
in his brown striped blanket
with storerooms in his face!
Gray squirrels with bushy tails
run up and down the trees.
They chatter to me.
They make me laugh.
I pull my skirts around me
and follow the squirrels.
Now I know where they live.
Now I know where I can find
piñon nuts this autumn.
I feel the warmth
of Sun-Bearer's shield
against my back.
And on my face
I feel cool fingers
of rain-cloud shadows.
With my hands on the warm earth
beside me,
almost,
I can feel things growing.
Why did I think
I was alone?