Spokane, 1976

Spokane, 1976


How easy to be Indian
in the Park Lane Motel.

From the bathroom window
I could see K Mart
if I stood on the toilet.

Dad had money in his wallet
and four kids small enough
to all sleep in the same bed
while he and Mom lay down together
on the floor.

We watched karate movies
at the East Sprague Drive-In
and I didn't mind the dubbed dialogue.

It would be years before my voice was lost
the same way.

Mornings, we'd catch a bus downtown
and browsed through old comic books
at Dutch's Pawn Shop and never worried
about the televisions, typewriters, guitars.

Then, Dutch's musty smell was like a secret guarded.
I didn't know it was quiet desperation.

How wonderful my father knew every drunk Indian
in the city!

Once, my father saw an old Indian
man weeping on the corner and drove around
the block twelve times before he remembered
the old man's name
and shouted it out the window so the old man
would also remember.

That was the summer of continual fireworks.

Over Spokane Falls
in a blue gondola, I leaned over the edge
and saw ghosts of salmon jumping.

It was the kind of celebration this country
would never see again.


Sherman Alexie........from Old Shirts & New Skins