Two Poems by Denise Low

Editor’s note. According to philosopher Enrique Dussel, it wasn’t until Europeans colonized the Americas, subjected and slaughtered its people, and plundered its wealth that they went from being inhabitants of a backwater of the world to thinking they were inherently better than everyone else. True, the notion of Indigenous people as natural-born “stewards of the land” is a  stereotype. But then again, they didn’t invent the steam engine.
     And here we are, in a climate emergency.
     Today’s guest post of two poems by Denise Low shows you how it all began.

First Contact: Interglacial Sagas
 
Anno Domin / i     Domin / ion     Domin / ate
                                               
half the     known     edge
world’s end                               waves Mer-men     
 
     start with
                                first blow         first
                                                                  bellow
breath of sea monsters
                   [I find a map illustrated with sea pigs]

two worlds [and oceans between]
           
1. white-skinned people
2. brown skinned with            ochre paint
           
                   maybe where
 
                   [in another map’s ocean swims a fish-centaur man]
 
Saint Brendan in annals
The voyage is dated to AD 512–530
                            (Betha Brenainn / Vita Brendan)
 
                                                   “vines suitable for wine”
When they light a fire, the island sinks; they realize that it is actually a whale.
 
Skraelings, those who wear skins
                 [of beasts]
 
                 [Later my black straight hair
                  at birth turns Norse blonde
                  under cloth my Mongolian spots]
 
Furs valued and traded
 
A market was formed between them; and this people in their purchases preferred red cloth; in exchange they had furs to give, and skins quite grey. They wished also to buy swords and lances, but Karlsefni and Snorri forbad it.
 
            milch /milk given for furs before they would leave without bloodshed
 
            [trade these years of warm seas
            before another age of cold returned]
 
A great crowd of Skrælingar boats, coming down upon them like a stream, the staves this time being all brandished in the direction opposite to the sun’s motion [backlit]
 
in Markland / in Forestland
[named on parchment]
 
Then took they and bare red shields to meet them. They encountered one another and fought, and there was a great shower of missiles.
 
                            voiceless Indigenous unvoiced amidst          
                            waters between Iceland and Newfoundland
                            roll of unceasing waters

            where     
                             a birch bark cartograph
                            [thin as parchment]
                            of clans
                            glyphs of epic stories: Listen
 
Greenlandic Inuit Newfoundland Inuit
also
Innu Mi'kmaq Southern Inuit of NunatuKavut
[Munsee Unami Lenape to their south
and my grandfather’s people]
 
[Irish Scots English to their east
and my other grandfather’s people]
 
 
[1400s MS illustration of St. Brendan, Wikipedia
The Saga of Erik the Red, 1880 translation into English by J. Sephton from the original Icelandic ’Eiríks saga rauða’.https://sagadb.org/eiriks_saga_rauda.en ]

My ([Broken] [Forbidden] Indigenous) Identity
 
                Pale mountain lions     a female and mate
                low-slung bodies     whip tails
                Our neighborhood laps     their territory
 
The cats walk     night edges 
shapeshifters     turning into lynxes
 
                  enormous tabby cats     with whiskers
                  ear tufts     almond-shaped green eyes 
                  The first I dream of cats     that day
 
I find Julie Buffalo Head’s     painting
Blood and a Single Tree    dripping vermillion    
 
                  A crow looks outdoors     from a windowsill    
                  Another crow holds chalk     draws a spiral
                  a portal where words     rise like smoke
 
A raccoon     against a wall of red stains    
bleeds from fatal wounds     reaches for blue
 
                 A deer lies on the floor     tongue lolling
                 side covered in Ponca      floral designs
                 A suited man’s figure wears      a cat’s face
 
Na shëwanàkw            White Man
What have you / I       done to us?

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Denise Low is the author, most recently, of The Turtle's Beating Heart: One Family's Story of Lenape Survival (U of Nebraska Press, 2017); Mélange Block (Red Mountain Press, 2014); Natural Theologies: Essays about Literature of the New Middle West (The Backwaters Press, 2011); New and Selected Poems (Penthe, 2007); and the forthcoming Northern Cheyenne Ledger Art by Fort Robinson Breakout Survivors (with Ramon Powers, U. of Nebraska Press, 2020). She lives (and dodges wildfires) in Northern California.