Northwest at Raven

Smoke Signals

Ken Siro

I could hardly wait for your nightly call
Because this time I had something to really tell you
In answer to your usual sweet question
How're you doin'?
 
Instead of my usual boring answer
OK
Just hanging out, watching TV
Getting drunk alone
 
I had a story to tell
Getting drunk with people on our deck
Exactly where these people's people's people and those before them
Lived and fished
 
No floating houses, dry docks, party boats with strange people gawking
Just quiet, big cedars, hemlocks and firs
No agreements with The Man or fighting over fishing rights with other tribes
Plenty for everyone, whenever, wherever
 
We sat there on "our" deck
Drinking spirits from our bottles
Me feeling guilty about trespassing on the land of his ancestors
And him saying, "This is a neat place; I'd like to live here"
 
So we talked about fish and women
And he gave me one―a Sockeye, that is―a bright five-pounder
Why?  For letting him tie off his net on "our" dock
For inviting him and his son to sit on "our" deck; use "our" bathroom
 
For being an unusual White Man, I guess
Although he didn't quite put it that way
"Not everyone would be this nice," he said
And we talked of beatings by local sheriffs when he ventures into
        his traditional hunting grounds
 
Five AM and I watch them haul in their fish which they'll sell for $2 a pound
The QFC sells it for five
I fall back to sleep and wake up sad
But I filet out my gift and set it to smoking in my "Little Chief"
 
And I sit here and ponder my complicity in the history of inhumanity
And the sweet smell of applewood smoke and salmon seeps through
        the cracks of the doors
And I imagine skewered slabs of fish in pyramid over fire
        along a river flowing out to the Sound
And I realize that my sadness is not just about injustice
 
But about not having shared this experience with you