kaniatarowanenneh

sam cooke on the radio.

save the last dance.

old home glides by.

the river.

my tóta and her fallen stone. rain on the window. blood red leaves in the roadside marsh. broken down farm houses by the highway.

not the same old water tower that i used to climb.

watch the trucks go by.

not the town i remember.

not my home.

but i walked these woods as a boy. or something like these woods.

even with the windows closed i can smell the river.

or maybe that’s just in my head.

it’s cold and clean now. the river. not the weed choked stinking sludge that i knew when i was a boy.

not the mighty man killer that my ancestors knew.

not kaniatarowanenneh.

something else now. this river. new name. a saint from some far away place. some far away time.

i left a me behind here.

in these woods. by this river. on the island where my tóta lived. in the catholic cemetery where she never wanted to be buried. where someone has knocked over her stone.

sam cooke sings on and on.

city passing by my window.

not my city now.

not my town. not my village.

not my home.

something lost here. something i can’t name. lost long ago.

like my hands in the january cold.

these hands. these gnarled and twisted fingers that i call hands. like the river, but nothing like the river. nothing like the hands they started out to be.

whispered ungrasped memories.

whispered ungrasped thoughts drifting away.

unfamiliar.

lost.

little boy.

dirty little indian. dirty snot nosed little indian.

long time ago lost.

lingering like a drifting ghost through memory. reaching out with gnarled frost bitten fumbling fingers.

haunting.

haunted.

dirty little indian. dirty broken little indian.

haunting. haunted. ghost like.

unfamiliar.

still he lingers.

still it lingers.

on some old water tower praying for the fall. on some lost island praying for the end. on some lost river praying to be carried away forever. by his grandmother’s grave with the fallen stone.

left behind. weeping silently in the darkness.

broken bloody angry afraid. silent howling out his agony.

this was his place.

not my place.

not this me.

sam cooke knew.

and marvin too.

leonard cohen. born by the same river with some distant saint’s name.

some distant saint’s name.

they all knew.

they all understood the haunting.

not him. not that little boy.

not that dirty little indian with the gnarled frost eaten fingers. he didn’t know anything. he didn’t know how to be indian all the way. he didn’t know how to be white even part of the way.

praying for the fall. snot dribbling down his sun burnt wind burnt skin.

dirty little half breed. dirty little broken half breed.

he didn’t know.

he didn’t know this me.

i don’t know him.

just a thought.

drifting.

just a ghost. ghost dancing. in some hollow place inside me. some empty place. some forgotten place.

in the marshes drifting by rain streaked window.

if it keeps raining he might drown.

there is no light, no breath there in the marshes. there is no warmth among the reeds. just some hollow wilted quintessent weeping shivering unfamiliarity. some might have been. some lingering wisp. some drifting memory.

sam cooke’s voice drifts away.

just drifts away.

like the river.

kaniatarowanenneh.

some kind of unfamiliar long ago story.

drifting. yet still lingering. still lingering.

drifting away but not all the way.

and the rain just keeps falling.

and i.

i.

this today me.

just keeps drifting.

just keeps right on drifting.

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