The silence of the reservation

could fill my mouth

to the point of breaking & I’d be

the boy in the front

yard—come out & play

 tóota’—can you see the fleshed

curving of my shoulders turned

black as near midnight? I’m right

here.                No tóota’ there isn’t an arch-

angel here to drag you

off to hell or purgatory or even

paradise. Look. So many

skies.

The other fathers are still

staring—reaching far enough

to smear the stars with their rough hands

holy & dark. Just like yours.

Watch this: how when you breathe in

the night somewhere

in your body

is white as frost from the day before

the first snowfall of the year.

The stars are

teething. Have you forgotten

everything already?      Mom said that

there will be three days

of darkness at the end of the world—

that all the white people are

buying up all the bullets

to wipe us out. Again. I told my friends

I’ll be dead before winter

break ends. They believe me.

The computers will run

                        an error the size

of oceans howling crazy for

the pale moon & will hurtle through

our bodies to get there.

My brother

says the lights across the river will burn

out.                                    ’íice’ is in her room with the door

locked. Ask her. You know

I made a deal with ’iceyéeye &

God tonight while keeping a secret: the stars

are dead.           Like you. I’m waiting

in the yard for an answer to

the world. At the end they are saying

you see nothing without light.                          Find me

there tóota’. The wind promised

we’ll finally see its voice.