Irene Lampe
Puts her husband to rest.
Little patches of grey grass
Cover William’s casket.
On the tombstone, to the left
Reads:
Irene Lamp, 1925—

It’s too bad, she says.
It’s too bad I don’t know
When I’ll die.
It’s too bad.

It is too bad.
It’s too bad we have on/off switches
For our loves, for our daily vows,
For the images we keep of ourselves.
It’s too bad our hands have lost
The feel for mud and ash.
It’s too bad we stumble
Over the words to console,
To balance out, to rearrange.
It’s too bad our restless bodies
Won’t sit with each other,
And rumble, beating time
With the magic
Of the grieving coasts.

The Gagiit still haunts us.
The healing people are blocked
From the path to the invisible land.
No one goes out in the storming rain.
A voice told the young man
To stop
Or he’d be tormented.
He did not heed the voice.

It used to be, she says,
That people couldn’t speak English.
Now we’re incomplete.
Groping for reminders
Of our hidden halves.

Wolf, my outer shell,
I know you are looking
For your brothers.
For now, I’ll use my wings,
Or my nose, to burrow down,
And put my breath to
Your covered wound.

Ishmael Hope