rattles

Rattle:

There were

Four or five rattles

All sitting nice

On a brightly colored

Star blanket

On the altar

They looked like buckskin

So smoothly wrapped around

A gourd or something

A couple had horns

Like a devil

A couple others

had horsehair

streaming down

from the handle

they looked pretty important

I’d seen them lots over the years

All over the place

In old

nearly abandoned

Rez churches

People’s houses

Treatment centers

Sundances

Vision quests

All of the rattles

In a row

I stared at them

While my uncle

Matoa Omani

Growled at everyone

Telling them stories

About his journey

How it brought him

To the Red Road

From the darkness

Almost boasting about it

While my other Mach-Peya Tekula

Sat silently broodingly

Playing with his braids

His moustache

Patiently waiting

For the ceremony to begin

And make

Stars of them both

Then it was over

The speeches

The warnings

The heeding for anyone

To leave without the will

Or nerves

And the darkness

Fell upon us all

A darkness like no other

As the ceremony started

And I thought back

To my first sundance

Under the endless blue

Skies of wolf point

And that first night

At my uncle’s house

Staring up at the vast

Night sky

Lying on a bedroll

At more stars than I’d ever seen

Glimmering silently

The universe holds so many

Secrets from us all

As I lay there I knew

In a few days

My blood would be spilt

Beneath the blue sky

A lot of blood would

Be spilt

And now

Thinking back to that time

I watched

As the sparks dropped down

A sign that the grandfathers

And grandmothers

Were arriving

And I knew in a few moments

The rattles would be flying around

The room in total darkness

A room full of people

Full of people

On the floor

Huddled together

In a darkness so complete

Not even a sliver of light

Could pierce through

And I knew the whole

Building would begin shaking

The floor rumbling

As though vast herds of buffalo

Of deer

Of elk

Were circling outside

And sometimes you could hear

Bears growling fiercely

And I would always picture them

Standing and scraping

At the windows and doors

And then the flap of wings

Would be everywhere

Huge wings

That cooled you off every time

They passed over you

And I fought hard the urge

To reach out

And to try to grab a rattle

As it flew overhead

Shaking like rattlesnake tails

Everywhere at once in the darkness

It always made me wonder

If there was more to this life

Than it seemed

And now

As I live

A less-than traditional life

I miss those days

And do not know

If I can

Ever return.