Dip, scoop,
Lift, turn, throw

Repeat
Repeat
Repeat
Repeat

Clear the white
Bright and hard packed snow

Expose the sidewalk
Waiting for summer
To be covered by green clippings
And darkened by the sprinkler
Cooling on a hot day

But now uncovered
By a twisted and sore back.

I hear the droning moans of Winter
Blowing on my house so cold
Northwest winds from Dakota plains
Aimed at this Dakota home

It’s endurance is commendable
One hundred and eight years
Of standing here in this weather,
I have only been here forty-nine

There are creaks and groans
And sagging a bit from settling
Crackled, worn and flaking...
And the house is aging too.

My Dakota plains
Broken by clusters of trees
That surround farms
Connected by black thin lines
Draped between poles
That follow roads

Or a shortcut across fields
On giant steel mannequins
Standing watch over
Corn, beans, sunflower
Or cows or horses
Or sheep

On My Dakota prairie
With rich black dirt
That feed crops
And sustain our towns
Our clusters of life
Our family and self.

I was born under great open skies,
Brought up with the smell of coal-black smoke
Hovering over the family farm.
I grew as distant sounds of whooping
Echoed like thunder across the land
And I was raised on bias, which clung
To the white men of the Black Hills like
Their guns, their religion, and their homesteads.

Those Hills are no place for me.
Look at my multi-colored dress, the
Multi-million-dollar stage, the
Multi-colored lights hanging over me.
This is my home. I thrive in this place.

Gone are the chiefs and their headdresses.
Gone are the dream-catchers and stories
Of battles between Unkthei, the
Serpant, and Wakinyan, the eagle.
Gone is Crazy Horse, always wily
Like the winter fox.
All cast off for a new life of bias.

I make the formula that nurtures
Bias in every little kid’s mind.
Every day’s the same. I spew my words,
My angry, petrol-soaked vitriol,
Which deludes their minds. They’ll be
“pigs” in the not-too-distant future.

In a way, this life disappoints me.
The trailer homes of Indians were
Run-down and forgotten about.
They lived lives of quiet desperation. No
Spotlights shined on their struggles.
The men who killed their kin were immortal.

But pow-wows in South Dakota were
*****, dingy, and dark, yet they were
Attended by many a native.
The farms were barren and gray,
Stockpiles of grain long gone, given to
The plutocratic hands of Washington.
Aunt Ida clung to this world.
Aunt Ida is dead and forgotten.

I was raised on bias in the Black
Hills, and I will stay biased for the rest
Of my days. Why would I give it up?
Joseph, the great Chief, never know
Such a life.