Fire Water World

Something About Being an Indian

There's something about being an Indian
we say to each other in a Bishop saloon
both of us forty with pony tails
grown down long to our Levi butts.
Yes, brother, it is the heart, and it is
the blood that we share.
The heart alone is not enough.

There's something about being an Indian
we say in soft whiskey voices that remember
many soft, brown women.
We laugh past the window and its vision
of constant traffic, the aimless yuppies
bound for the ski lodges.
Snow must be licentious for such fools:
white sheets to be soiled with temporal chill.
Yes, there's something about being an Indian
we say as we exit into the warmth
of Hell's secondary nature,
a place we call the Fire Water World.

Adrian C. Louis