KIVA


The U.S. Navy frigate
finally makes port in Boston
five days shy of Thanksgiving

the entire crew streaming
ashore on leave in
dozens of spit-polished
blue lines radiating
from a single gangplank
through the city of
blue noses and red roses

then along highways
byways and skyways in
an expanding starburst
seeking points of
light and family
from sea to shining sea

Where one of these GI issue
ley lines intersects with
my somewhat shaggier
thread at Four Corners
that big flat silence
where four states meet
on my roadmap

Petty Officer Third Class
Freddy Freeman and I
now ride one single
jackrabbit line westward
in a rented '79 Mustang

he pays for gas
I pay tolls and fries

Freddy's folks live on
the champagne shores
of La Jolla California
and he has never seen
the Arizona desert
never swum in an ocean
that was not blue
and full of fish

so we detour to
the Petrified Forest
National Park 

stare at trees
that are not green
with roots that
do not drink in
the iron and manganese
and carbon rainbows
of the Painted Desert

We wander along the top
of a broad dusty arroyo
with sides cut deep by
invisible waters lost
to invisible histories
an empty goblet laughing
at thirsty travelers

"We used to carve our initials and stuff on rocks at the beach"

then stand upon
wind lashed boulders to
study the ancient petroglyphs
of Newspaper Rock
carved so many tongues ago
before Spanish Latin English
words of conquest wiped
the voices from these
silent stone prayers

"Not too cool Freddy they bust you for that"

I note one in particular
a snake pointing to
a distant pair of mountains
or just pointing away

"Yea but hell we were just kids"

Then we visit
the village

The Puerco Indian Ruin
nothing to see really
but a small network of
adobe walls barely giving
shelter to scorpions

no artifacts or furniture
no tools or children's toys
no sacred sandpaintings
for sale to tourists
no Puerco Indians

only the walls
quiet as a wind
with a secret

That is the great mystery
explained the wooden sign
affixed with various
U.S. Government amulets

Where did
the Puerco Indians go
did they march or flee
from pestilence and war
or to vision and dream
why did they leave behind
nothing but blank walls
six hundred years ago

"What's all that stuff?"

I pull out a few items of
basic cross-country gear

"I'm going to visit the old Indians"

canteen compass bandages...

"The sign says there aren't any more"

athame cord silver chalice...

"Shouldn't take too long then"

Having suffered through
a whole year as a Tenderfoot
in the Boy Scouts of America
I like to be prepared

"Well I'll just wait here by the car"

I stroll to the village kiva
a small square chamber once
used for ritual and prayer
half buried into the earth
its timber roof long since
rotted off or eaten by bugs

I climb over a low wall
made of the same stuff as
this small part of our planet
cupping the empty church in
Her cool clay hands

After a moment or two
just to breathe
I leap inside

Four flat stones
as nearly triangular
as a village might find
if it kept its eye peeled
lay on the dirt floor
in each corner where
the walls intersect

I snap open my compass
not the walls
but the corners
the stones themselves
mark the cardinal points

I pull out my athame
swing it about me in
a circle another circle
another circle casting
the ancient ritual of
greeting...

...and then double over
my arms wrapping around
a sudden stabbing pain
riveting my ulcerated gut

like some ancient warrior
had pulled an arrowhead
from his own exploding heart
to thrust it somewhere
below mine

No not again
I left all that
three thousand miles
and as many gold-leaved
doctor bills and stinking
herbal remedies and
bloodied blankets ago

a little weak maybe
learning to walk
straight again yes
but not this
not the pain
not again

Silly little Witch
some part of me still alive
mutters to my own remaining
rattlesnake nerves
why does youth need to
mess around with ghosts
and I wonder why these ghosts
still cry holes into my belly
my home my home oh my home

So I have met
the Puerco Indians
or the part of them
that had never really
left this place of walls
when the river ran dry

Fingers hanging from
my knuckles like shoestrings
I pull out my plastic canteen
twist off the oversized cap
hold out the silver chalice
at shivering arms' length
pour it almost full of warm
stale Oklahoma spring water
take one sweet sip and
pour the rest into the sand...

...the pain
disappears
along with
everything else

          *  *  *

What drives a People from
the shores of hearth and home
can also anchor their
spirits behind them
lingering among memories
of older and better songs

especially the elders
who must have led
the last nights of
dancing and wailing before
leading their village away
setting a dusty sail
to a new oasis
to drink once again
Her fresh river tears

"You all done then"

Pulling myself
halfway up the wall
I twist about and glance
at old cigarette butts
littering the floor

sweep a free arm across
the adobe and stone and
desert air so dry that it
sucks the spit from your mouth

so that any curious fool
who follows this one
into this old house
would also remember

"Yea let's get some tostadas maybe a beer"

So Freddy and I head west
to Southern California
passing through
the Coachella Valley
where we scoop up handfuls
of prehistoric shells in
the sands of a dead sea
then to San Diego County and
our separate threads of life

Call it magical conceit
or literary license
or a last prayer to
my own holy presumption

but in that kiva I cast
my only real spell
on this journey from
the Eastern Seaboard to
my beloved Pacific Ocean

"You know I'm starting to miss Navy food..."

and I may never know
if it ever worked

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This poem is from On Pagan Roads Copyright © 2004 David Arv Bragi