Poems of Paradox: Sherman Alexie

The Powwow at the End of the World
BY SHERMAN ALEXIE
I am told by many of you that I must forgive
and so I shall   
after an Indian woman puts her shoulder to the Grand Coulee Dam   
and topples it.
I am told by many of you that I must forgive   
and so I shall
after the floodwaters burst each successive dam  downriver from the Grand Coulee.
I am told by many of you   
that I must forgive and so I shall after the floodwaters find their way to the mouth of the Columbia River as it enters the Pacific and causes all of it to rise.
I am told by many of you that I must forgive   
and so I shall
after the first drop of floodwater is swallowed by that salmon waiting in the Pacific.
I am told by many of you that I must forgive
and so I shall   
after that salmon swims upstream, through the mouth of the Columbia and then past the flooded cities, broken dams and abandoned reactors of Hanford.
I am told by many of you that I must forgive
and so I shall   
after that salmon swims through the mouth of the Spokane River as it meets the Columbia, then upstream, until it arrives in the shallows of a secret bay on the reservation where I wait alone.   
I am told by many of you that I must forgive
and so I shall
after that salmon leaps into the night air above the water, throws a lightning bolt at the brush near my feet, and starts the fire which will lead all of the lost Indians home.
I am told by many of you that I must forgive
and so I shall   
after we Indians have gathered around the fire with that salmon who has three stories it must tell before sunrise: one story will teach us how to pray;
another story will make us laugh for hours;   
the third story will give us reason to dance.
I am told by many of you that I must forgive
and so I shall
when I am dancing with my tribe during the powwow at the end of the world.


Sherman Alexie, “The Powwow at the End of the World” from The Summer of Black Widows. Copyright © 1996

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