Dance, Pray, Heal: Strong Medicine Content warning: alcoholism, self harm Last fall, I let my guard down in the place where spirits get eaten. I found myself alone in my empty two-bedroom apartment on the reservation, sending up smoke to Creator. It was a time of reckoning. “Please give me strength and vision ...

K8g8gwibakw Wantastegokwajok Wintergreen on Mount Wantastiquet   Ali-sowanikik nahil8t Kwenitegok wji Wantastegokwajok Southward downstream on the Connecticut River from Mount Wantastiquet Wantastegok peb8niwi tamakwak The West River in winter at the beaver place   Sp8zsigwan Peskawajok  Early spring at Black Mountain Ali-sowanakik wji kchi al8mkiwajok Southward from the great mountain ...

"...He is said to have been the last Red Man in Acton ..." (Robert Frost)

Not Perfect I don’t shower everyday. I’m not perfect. I sing off-key when I drive on the highway I’m not perfect, I have a dedicated partner but still get crushes everyday. But hey, I’m not perfect. There are a lot of things I can forgive and understand as human error, ...

Coats 1. It was fall and he was gone again. Oh, he’ll probably come back drunk, she thought to herself. And he thinks I drink way too much, hunh! She smoothed back her hair and looked in the mirror. That deep longing of loneliness was tugging at her again. The ...

To The Young Couple  In The Booth Across From Me   You looked into each other’s eyes while above you five televisions blared five different games and around you Friday Night Happy Hour cursed and howled and waitresses in short kilts and kneesocks danced past you blouses molded to their ...

Believe   Hold on, be strong  Finding our strength in who we are  Through our ancestor’s ways  Will help us get through each and every day.  No time for shame or blame  Our life is no game  We go through hurt of pain  If we choose to dwell  We have nothing ...

T8ni Kizos Wazwasa – Winter Solstice Terraced lines shine silver,Layers upon the cross-hatched riverbanksThreads of smoke rise still and silent from domed sheltersNo dog barks at the half moon.Long night gone in the morning chill,Slow light gleams at eastward doorSun comes returning, scarce recognizedBut met with quiet welcome.A long time ...

Water is as essential to our collective lives as the blood pumping through our human hearts. You might correlate our bodies and the body of our Mother. We are connected to Her as children at the breast. Water Psalm Bless the water, the flow, the ebb, the seep. Bubble it, ...

Phillip at Wachusett The grating of the dried oaks of Wachusettleaf upon layered leafwould shatter the wind’s soft lilting whisperin the sea-pines at Pokanoket.I listen for it nightly in my sleep,and hear the wandering dead of the Wampanoagswailing amongst the duneslooking for their people.My father went among the Nipmucsto die; ...

Cecelia Estrada Vaughan/iti kafi The Lady who lived next to the Railroad Tracks When ipok, granddaughter, and her parents left home to visit the Lady, Mama cuddled her little girl tight and kissed her four times. The little girl wore her Simplicity Pattern jumper dress made by her mother, laced ...

Pushing the Boundaries: An Interview with Two New England Native Artists Virginia McLaurin is a PhD student in the Anthropology Department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, specializing in Native Studies and Film. Her Eastern Cherokee ancestry led to her academic focus on both dominant filmic and televisual representations of ...