by Sherwin Bitsui

    Point north， north where they walk

    in long blankets of curled bark，

    dividing a line in the sand，

    smelling like cracked shell，

    desert wind， river where they left you

    calling wolves from the hills，

    a list of names

    growling¹ from within the whirlwind.

    Woman from the north，

    lost sister who clapped at rain clouds.

    We were once there

    holding lightning bolts

    above the heads of sleeping snakes.

    Woman， sister， the cave wants our skin back，

    it wants to shake our legs free from salt

    and untwist our hair into strands² of yarn³

    pulled rootless from the pocket of a man

    who barks when he is reminded of the setting sun.

    At 5 A.M.， crickets gather in the doorway⁴，

    each of them a handful of smoke，

    crawling to the house of a weeping woman，

    breaking rocks on the thigh⁵ of a man stretching，

    ordering us to drop coins into her shadow，

    saying， "There， that is where we were born."

    Born with leaves under our coats，

    two years of solitude⁶，

    the sky never sailed from us，

    we rowed toward it，

    only to find a shell，

    a house，

    and a weeping woman.

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