YouTube- Whitehawk and Crowe - Wi`kiwa`m Ahsin (Tipi Rock)YouTube- Pete Singing.mp3
Introduction
They call me Manny. I grew up being called Monolin. From the time I was four up to my early twenties, uncle Manuel called me Loco. I’m comfortable just being called, Manny.
Today is January 11, 2007.
Three days before New Year’s Night, Hector, a Native American Spiritual Advisor for the brothers in San Quentin, took me to Stockton, to retrieve my property kept in a storage station for the past six years.
I asked Hector if we could stop to visit uncle Harry Jack while we were there in town. He’s close to ninety years old. Harry is a Navajo Elder and prayer man for the Black Wolf Gourd Society. Last I saw him was several months ago, he was ill. Harry had been in the hospital twice since then.
It was good to visit him. He seemed much healthier. He asked that I light a fire on New Years night, to pray for a good year to come. I promised him I would and with that I hugged him and smudged him with a stick of sage, and we departed.
That New Year’s Eve afternoon, my aunt Keti made tamales and invited me over to eat and watch movies.
My mind was on other things though, like the things in the cardboard boxes I retrieved from storage. I was reacquainted with the many notebooks of poems and short stories I had written, covering a span of three decades, and it brought back many memories, dormant for a long time. And my thoughts were preoccupied with that. I had written just about everything going on around me. But all those writings never made it to book form.
That day, going through my things, I realized just how quickly time has passed. I began to look at life in another way. Like a leaf.
I realized I was no longer that young wild guy, who spent his life in one Cause, or another. Here I was, older, broke, homeless. I say homeless because I lived in a tent out back since last May, until recently, when it got too cold for me to handle, and stubbornness wasn’t a reasonable option anymore.
I was married once, when I was twenty-one, and divorced shortly after. I never fathered any children.
In my early years I labored in the fields, in the canneries, in
landscape, in janitorial, a dishwasher for several restaurants, just about any dirty job you can imagine, and yes, even for a sewage facility in Stockton.
I managed though, to earn an A.A. Degree from San Joaquin Delta College, through the crazy and turbulent times in the Seventies. And reading through the notebooks took on a whole new light, bringing the past to life.
But, back to New Years Eve.
While I was sitting in my aunt and uncle’s modular home, in front of the t.v. zoning out, I thought about the many years I’d been away from here, home. Over twenty, since I had left Livingston. I landed up in Stockton in a De-tox center and in the Hospital out in French Camp. Drinking had caught up with me. And I needed mending.
I never envisioned returning. Especially not back here, in the country, on this land, surrounded by fields and a few shacks, housing migrant workers. But here I was, with nowhere else to go. Fifty-one.
While I was sitting there, my youngest sister and niece entered. My niece was expecting at any time. I still see her as a child, but she isn’t. She is a woman about to have her first born. The fifth generation American.
Before they left, I had gone out back by the cactus and dug a hole and placed in some kindling and logs. Just in case I decided to light a fire, as Harry Jack had asked. It was already very cold and suppose to freeze overnight, with that in mind I figured if it got too cold to wait until morning.
When my sister and niece got ready to leave, I took my eagle feather, a braid of sweetgrass, and smudged them down, and prayed for them.
That night around 11:30, I decided to light the fire. In spite of the frigid temperature. It took some work to get it going. When the gunshots went off in town, a few miles north, it signaled in the New Year. And the fire took on a life of it’s own.
I had my pipe, the one I use for the Sundance in South Dakota, a hand drum, a rattle, sage, sweetgrass and cedar to throw in the fire. I finished giving thanks to Grandfather and praying for the world, and us, and sat there before the fire. My uncle Manuel and my cousin Manolo came out to join me after, and so did my friend Suzanne, coming from her family’s gathering, stopping here on her way home, to share in a hot cup of cocoa. They stayed awhile and went home.
That night in the cold, I felt the spirits of my ancestors around me. And together we celebrated, in the fire. And I sang a song.
Thank You Grandfather.
All My Relations
Behind The Lodge
The tin door to this
matchbox ramada on flat tires
swings open west
where ancestors having crossed-over
journey to their eternal rest
from here behind Three Rivers Lodge
I observe center nerve of an infinite
Universe:
An almond orchard
shielding ghostly California Coast Ranges
A Hogan we ceremony in night long
around the fire with medicine and songs
a sweatlodge where steam the breath
of Grandfather purifies
our common pitiful bodies
minds and spirits
a pow-wow arena alive only
4th of July weekends
here through Indian eyes
I observe this tiny world dawn to dusk
where no wars wage
and there aren’t drive-by’s or roadrage
where no dope dealers poison
for pathetic profit their own peoples
where no theologians solicit
theories of apocalypses
where no political piranhas propagate
ideological deceptions
where no manifest-destiny build fences fashioned
from blueprints for genocide
no
here I observe
tiny country world where Indian men
in a Recovery Center smile sober
here I observe
top of arena’s center pole
a redtail hawk perched
scoping for dinner
squirrels dashing underground
here I listen
to a band of coyotes
invisible but close
howling their bellies
desire chickens or goats
or both
here I observe
sky shed it’s blue
into hues of reds and purples
as a laughing moon balloons up
to it’s temple
and harmonic stars robe around it
as San Joaquin Delta breezes purge
through whispering ol’ trees
swaying in mild mannered dance
as warrior magpies kamikaze the hawk
and crickets and their tiny cousins
riot across sacred grounds
as evenings’ ceremony blooms into
night song
here from an abalone shell
a stick of sage is lit and I smudge
giving thanks for another day
has lived and is gone
and I step into the trailer
hit the sack a tired cat
prepare to journey into
dreamworld where
anything and everything is possible
but before that
peep out tiny window
observe a dozen spirits
dance around the arena
like they always do
behind the lodge .
I Dread
Grandpa Hawk perched in a tree
looked down at me
on a stump gazing
at fields being primed
for the advancement of the times
and asked unassumingly:
What is in your heart?
And so I began to speak;
I dread this alien rat race
mirrored in congested
big city phlegm
manifest-destiny all over again
mixing into this country world
like oil with water
strangers with shark-like expressions
convoluting the landscape
in Hummers Volvos SUV’s
along with their collective wannabe’s
I dread this transformation of
new homes and buildings
expanding like popcorn
no locals can afford
I dread this attack of the new-age Borg;
Resistance Is Futile-You Must Assimilate
I dread these pimps of poorly planned
progress for pathetic self-profit
I dread taking scenic drives
in the country thundering
with traffic thick as bees on honey
being forced to find places
away from familiar places
where technology yet has targeted
its thoughtless tentacles
and capitalist clowns have yet
proclaimed their arrogant game
of eminent domain
places where open spaces
still be free of idiot boxes
blasting gangster obscenities
where no yuppies have fenced off
areas once always open and free
of eyes of steel and robotic gates
and fortresses of concrete
high as prison walls
and grandpa Hawk looked at me
with eyes of wisdom and said;
listen,
listen
to us
winged ones
four leggeds
insects
trees
rivers
as we sing
our death
songs,
then grandpa Hawk flew
off into the blue,
and I rose from the stump
for a bulldozer was coming
and I could no longer stay.
Sleepless Night In Stockton
1.
After work in America
in traffic
the rush
the noise
the smog
the elements of urbanization
digested as a I drive
and sullen I arrive
slip into my apartment
precision an about-face
and bolt in place
number-Twelve door shut
out the world
a world of worlds
weaving in wrangled
star-spangled waste
whirlin’ and churnin’ in
a self-destructive celebrated way
out the quagmire of
civil-I-zation
rush hour
road-rage
flip-me-off
bullshit
intoxicated and nauseated
by the animated
absurdities of it.
No child smiles flutter lovingly
arms racing ahead of them
to affectionately embrace me home.
Only the split-second entry
vacuum of variable musty
silence’s say: HELLO.
Then all of a sudden
as if by a push of an invisible button
resonates it’s fate once more:
This sorry sigh of resignation,
truly I abhor.
2.
And now
I filter into unwinding
easing these insensitive
ribbon strands
of twitchin’ glands
varieties of mind-blowin’
soul-suckin’
spirit-chompin’
anxieties
plopped out on a couch
in this sublime rhyme
of coagulated time
de-polorized in a hapless
humorless
hermitic pose,
self-imposed by whimsical desire
I suppose.
3.
And now
in the heat of night I articulate
a winding road of prose
paved with deep fried
figments of imagination
drawn from a cauldron
bubblin’ in my stupored sanity
where scattered embers of reality
melodramatically
gyrate
irate
in the echoing forest
of my inquisitiveness .
4.
For now
for the tick-tock being
I whirl
unfurl
in this empirical space
hollowed in grace
for this Is
the way of existencia
the truth my friend
as is should be
as is meant to be
this place
this center
of my world
a spot
a dot
like nowhere else
for the tick-tock being
in this whole vast
unchained universe
my world is here.
So I
unwinding
cherish my soul
so as not to perish from
these incandescent
meticulous
melancholy moments
soothing this bronze mechanism
of my cosmic conscious being
as my translucent thoughts
unravel
travel
across borders of imagination
and journey into thorny
thickets of perennial poetic hours
bloomin’ brilliant
like shades of wild flowers
silences irrevocably
lonely
yet lovely
lovely to their very cores
lovely as waves splash
a lonely islands shores
regions rich and ripe to explore
but only yours-truly there may soar.
5.
And I transfix
void of tricks
and soar-----wing
soar-----wing,
and nobody talks trash
and no phone rings
shing-a-ling
shing-a-ling
and no amor sings:
Love love me do.
6.
Unamused
but not confused
dedicated I transfuse
into fuses of San Joaquin
cool Delta breezes
bleeding profusely
through kitchen screen
gently on me
and pitter-patter poignantly
plastic blinds
like chimes
and sequestered here
most definitely
but not vividly I see
the years
Fifty:
bounced
cruised
crashed
and in this solitude
with gratitude and fortitude
I remember
my grandparents
father
mother
relations
homies
alive in photos
thumb-tacked
taped
packed-on
DON’T FORGET US walls
Who congregate
celebrate
in heavens hallowed halls
who joyfully converse
in golden silent verse
who dance tiptoe
on rose petal plains
Yaqui angels
swarm like cranes,
Who knew
Them?
Their struggles
their insanities
their dreams
their sorrows?
their lifetime-agos
dreamed-for
labored-for
prayed-for
better-tomorrows
never in their
dimensions fulfilled?
Them
their hopes and phantasms
Them
indigenous rightful
landlords of this soil
Them
exploited
thwarted,
who struggled
celebrated
prisms of tradition
and cried tears of dignity
and died
warriors
revolutionaries
railroad
dishwasher
field
cannery hands
barbers
butchers
artists
musicians
carpenters
tune-up kings
chicken pluckers
agriculture queens
herb runners
locos and locas
juicers and outlaws
farmers
charmers
nickel and dimers?
7.
And now
One- two- three
Yes
I am perplexed
And yes
still I wrestle
a desperate battle
with the spirits to inquire
to inspire
to address this nonsense
and the rest
and my simple thoughts
find themselves
in travail and
pow-wow in circles
in the wombs of their thunder
and meander
twigs down
sacred crimson rivers
flowing with age
searchin’
searchin’
searchin’
always searchin’
and the spirits responses
wade in glitters of shimmerin’
reflections of splendor
and wonder:
Not yet for you to know.
8.
And now
I explore above the heights
a hawk and circle
fields of the variety
the make-up
the essences
Of who I AM
Of what I AM
Of where I AM
Of why I AM
A Yaqui/Tarascan
maneuvering in this
reservation of modern-I-zation
everyday a battle
everyday a struggle
everyday a warrior.
For who I am
has not
can not
shall never
by the world be conquered
for this is inherently
in me
a cosmic impossibility
a dreamer
descendent of a dream
from long windin’
ancestral stream
of all but forgotten
ancient crossings .
9.
In retrospect
I detect
a wee-bit
isolated conflict:
Oh! What a crazy life!
Rollin-rollin-rollin’
keep them fires burnin’ AHO!
10.
And now
the sun rises
bright bold
above a naked flagpole
it’s glow melts the sky
a pretty shade of flame
fingers through
the window pane
caresses my face
swallows the moon
and glittering robe of stars
and the Delta breezes
cease to bleed
and although dawn
spawns tranquil
sweet
invigorating
alive
my eyes
care less
weigh a ton and flutter
like hummingbird wings
and my hued
cosmic conscious being
implores
requires
repose
and this beautiful morning
I’ll nap away
ride a spotted winged pony
across dream world plains.
And now I do
what I do
hold back that
no storm
ravages or savages
introspective
reflective
twin mirrors
of my soul
but in the hollows
of my battered
bruised
betrayed
bronzed heart
RAINS FIRE!
11.
Quiet
subdued
but not unglued
humbly I say
these words to THEE:
I sing
I pray
my pen shall bring
to wing
simple understanding
that the world may know
we may remember
we passed these roads
these codes
these loads
we lived Aho
12.
So now
I shut the blinds
cozy-up on the couch
turn the FM on low
catch some z’s.
Man’s-best-friend
The sky is not so bright
Fall is flagging her colors
On a mundane morning
Babysitting Buddy
Man’s-best-friend
Without a worldly care
Just sleeps on the floor
Until I walk out the door
And follows me outside
It’s got abandonment issues
And fleas
Pees on the trees
But he’s better company
Than most people
And doesn’t bite
One Day
My thoughts drip into my heart
Like rain outside the earth drinks
Sometime this hour a childhood friend
Someone I haven’t seen in some time
Is going under into everlasting rest
Unable to be there to show my respects
I burn sage in an abalone shell
Pray his spirit journey well
For he has crossed the river
One day we must maneuver
But none of us know the hour
None of us can deny
Freedom
Summertime in Modesto
Hot and sticky
Transients God-bless-America
Urinate in a parking lot
In broad daylight
Behind B of A
No shame to their game
More of them every day
In the alley ways
A few Scavenge
In huge garbage bins
For tasty morsels before
Maggots do
Tattered spirits in rags
Scraping along on sidewalks
Shared with solemn
Stiffs in grey suits
And shiny shoes
Opportunity
A fluffy white rabbit
No one seems to own
Spends its days idle in front
Hidden In the bushes
It devours the carrots
Lettuce and bread
We feed it in the morning
Across the street
In La Loma schoolyard
Perched on top a lone
Old oak tree
A big hawk occasionally
Circles overhead
Just above the bushes
Eyes on the prize
Just For Today
Words, spoke from my mind:
Put down the laptop
Turn off the TV
Get up go outside
Stretch out in the sun
Whiff- in the sweet breezes
Pin your ears to the bird songs
Eye the brilliance of the sky
Who knows about tomorrow?
The Good Red Road
When I was young and wayward
Tore-up from the floor up
An elder once told me to gather my medicine
I said: You mean roots and feathers?
No! The medicine within you
The good things inside you
You have to gather those things
You have to quit doing the bad
Only you can do this with help from Grandfather
And when you have gathered your medicine
You will know what it takes to get well
If you become ill in your spirit and mind
And stray away from the Good Red Road
Burnt Out
Did you hear about Juan?
No what happened?
He got put in the nut house
Oh Yeah? I saw him a few months ago in town
In shorts and army boots
Waving his hands in the air
Like he was talking to someone
I guess his mom is too old
Can’t take care of him anymore
He sure loved that dope
Yeah and now he’s through
His brain fried
And he ain’t even old
