The Sasquatch Poems

The Sasquatch Poems


Sasquatch: a hairy creature like a human being reported to
exist in the northwestern U.S. and western Canada and said
to be primate between 6 and 15 feet tall--called also bigfoot.
------Merrian Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 10th Edition

How our hearts are carried off by a hairy monster that may
live only in our hearts.
--Robert Michael Pyle:
Where Bigfoot Walks: Across the Dark Divide


1.

I believe in Sasquatch
just as much as I believe in God
which is not logical
since more people have seen Sasquatch
than have seen God.

2.

We hire priests and politicians
who promise us there are no mysteries,
only doors that can be opened easily.

3.

I don't believe doors
are proof of anything
other than doors.

4.

Mystery is a series of large footprints
leading us from the edge of the forest
to the center of the desert.

At the center: an Anasazi pot.

In Hopi, Anasazi means ancient, alien one.
After 1200 A.D. the Anasazi vanished, leaving behind
only the slightest traces of their sudden departure.

Only the Hopi know where they went.

5.

In the year I was born, a Sasquatch chaaed N
from Benjamin Lake to Turtle Lake.

N was on horseback
and still barely escaped.

N refuses to speak of this even now
and will only smile
when asked about the chase.

6.

Because we are human
we assign human emotions to Sasquatch.
When it chases N from lake to lake
we assume Sasquatch was angry.

How would our hearts change
if we discovered Sasquatch was running
just for the sake of the run, the burn
in the leg muscles and lungs?

7.

We tell these Sasquatch stories
because we are Spokane Indian.

We are Spokane
because our grandparents were Spokane.

Our grandparents told Sasquatch stories.
Our grandparents heard Sasquatch stories

told by their grandparents.
In this way, we come to worship.

8.

By now, the hunters and hobbyists also call them Sasquatch
because they have come to understand a little
of what Indians have always understood.

9.

Headlines in the tabloids:
"Bigfoot Baby Found
in Watermelon: Has Elvis' Sneer."

10.

Those who say "Bigfoot"
are those who don't believe.
We must learn to fear metaphor.

11.

We followed the footprints from the source of the stream
to the place where the stream emptied into the river.

We saw its hair snagged on branches ten feet above us.
Its smell was still powerful a full day after it had
passed through.

The smell: rotten eggs, sulfur, burned hair, blood, sawdust,
pine sap, bat piss, standing water, split granite, sunlight.

12.

Even now we like to think science replaced religion
when, in fact, religion became science.

13.

I ran into the house on fire and saved my father and mother.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my sister and brother.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my version of God.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my only effective
blanket.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my Adam and Eve.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my porcupine quill.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my cup of ice water.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my metamorphic rock.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my saxophone.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my last will
and testament.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my favorite red shirt.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my basketball.
I ran into the house on fire and saved my book about Sasquatch.

14.

After D.B. Cooper hijacked the commercial jet
and parachuted 30,000 feet into the Cascades
where he and his newly acquired money disappeared

we can only assume that he lived
because his death would kill the mystery.
My only certainity: D.B. Cooper is not Sasquatch.

15.

In order to know what Sasquatch is
we must know what he is not.

Here, I wonder why I speak of Sasquatch as male
when more female Sasquatch have been seen

including the most famous: the Sasquatch woman
who walked across deadfall in the film

shot by Roger Patterson on the Hupa Indian Reservation
in Northern California. We have all seen

her pendulous breasts, prominent brow, large feet
and shadowed eyes as she turns to face the camera,

and the commotion caused when Patterson's horse
threw him.
Patterson continued to film as he fell, as he climbed

to his feet, and ran after the Sasquatrch. His home movie
has never been discredited, only ignored or dismissed.

17.

The scientists don't want Sasquatch to exist
because her existence would destroy their God.

18.

Roger Patterson was a Yakima Indian
a fact which provides me with a small, secret pleasure.
I have been taught to keep secrets
and to fool you into believing I'll reveal them.

19.

If we sit in John F. Kennedy's limousine on November
22, 1963, and look back over our shoulder just as the
first shot is fired, we see a shadowy figure in the
sixth floor window of the Depository.

Moving closer, we can see the rifle, a gold ring,
and brown eyes. We can see a bead of sweat fall from
forehead to gun stock, soaking into the finely-grained
wood. We can see the gray smoke rise.

We do know that Sasquatch did not shoot JFK
but we wonder if the man who pulled the trigger
was hired by the same men who pay the scientists.

20.

On his deathbed Roger Patterson wished
he had shot the Sasquatch
and proved her existence with a corpse.

21.

Thesis: Indians can only be proved superstitious
in non-Indians are proven to be without superstition.

22.

Does the Sasquatch believe in us?

23.

Do you take the bread and wine
because you believe them to be the body and blood?
I take them, as other Indians do, too
because that colonial superstition is as beautiful
as any of our indigenous superstitions.

24.

Of course, Sasquatch and Indians have known of each other
for thousands of years. Certain Indians believed Sasquatch
were evil Indians banished from their respective tribes.

Others believed Sasquatch came down from the skies.
Some Indians have sat at lonely campfires and watched
the woods for signs of Sasquatch, their long lost cousin.

25.

A man named Anomaly is over there, in the dark
corner, with his eyes closed, dancing all by himself.

26.

I can give you proof of God: Jim Thorpe, Sac and Fox Indian,
won gold medals in the decathlon and pentathlon at the
1912 Stockholm Olympics. He won those medals despite the fact
that Indians were not yet recognized as United States citizens.

27.

Sasquatch did not kidnap the Lindbergh baby.
Sasquatch did not bury the empty coffin of Heinrich Muller.
Sasquatch did not kill the prostitutes in Whitechapel.
Sasquatch did not fly with Amelia Earhart.
Sasquatch did not roll the stone away from Jesus' tomb.
Sasquatch did not build the pyramids.
Sasquatch did not create the Ghost Dance.
Sasquatch did not drop the bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Sasquatch did not descend from the Missing Link.
Sasquatch did not drag boulders across Easter Island.
Sasquatch did not crash land in Roswell, New Mexico.
Sasquatch did not walk across the Bering Strait.
Sasquatch did not sink Lemuria.
Sasquatch did not write Shakespeare's plays.

28.

I can give you proof of Sasquatch: Indian tribes of the
Pacific Northwest carved ape faces into their totem poles
long before any Europeans arrived and brought news of such
animals. According to the scientists, there are no other
primates, aside from human beings, indigenous to
North America.

29.

If Sasquatch is the deviation
then what is the common rule?

30.

Late night on the Spokane Indian Reservation
we can hear the shrill cry echo through the pines.

We have recorded the cry and played it for the experts
who cannot tell us which animal made that sound.

31.

Because the Sasquatch use tools, I wonder if they write poems.
Because the Sasquatch steal salmon from nets, I wonder
if they have justice.
Because the Sasquatch travel alone, I wonder if they love.
Because the Sasquatch travel in families, I wonder
if they hate.
Because the Sasquatch smell bad, I wonder if they are afraid.
Because the Sasquatch cry in the night, I wonder
if they believe in God.

32.

A large footprint in the damp sand.
A bush burning on the mountain.

33.

When I asked the Indian elder, she said
with a smile, "I don't know if I believe in Sasquatch
but he sure do stink."


Sherman Alexie.............from The Summer of Black Widows