Grandma's Invitation

by Julene Waffle

“I can read a newspaper by the moonlight tonight,”

she said, looking out the window above the kitchen sink.

I knew it as a brief invitation,

scratched quickly on air,

to sit and watch the interstitial moments

of deep dusk turned night.

Moon-shadows dripped from tree branches

like honey-glaze on fresh-baked biscuits,

and breezes carried crushed fern and summer tree

musk down the mountain on their backs.

Under wind-tousled hair, we held our breaths

as nocturnal shadows danced and

jumped from tree to tree,

memories of midnight dreams.

Peepers chirruped their love songs;

their lovers answered flirtatiously.

Bats swooped silently for insect supper,

and evening birds tittered and whispered,

buttoning the last vestiges of day to close.

On nights like this, we’d sit on the porch

amidst unfinished chores and stories untold

in thin night dresses and slippers, ready for sleep,

willing witnesses, yet bed and pillow

insufficient temptations.

Together,

we’d sit and listen

in our own silences.

Eyes closed, she’d soak in the damp of

night and heart-whisper her

own love songs and dreams and memories.

Sometimes her lips would curl, flatten, or oh,

forming thoughts on air

but uttering  no sound.

Her white hair brushed out and standing on end,

a crown of wisdom or a cloud of doubt,

I didn’t know which.  

And me, afraid to listen, afraid to not,

I’d watch her, hoping to learn something,

but I couldn't tell what

except to say I wish I had asked.

© Julene Waffle. All rights reserved.

Julene Waffle is a mother of three boys and a secondary English Teacher for over 20 years in a small rural upstate New York school. Her love of language was perpetuated at Hartwick College and Binghamton University. Her poetry, speaking to the everyday people of her everyday life, is widely published.

All-american Gong Girl

By Deborah Jang 

Eldest daughter of Gong Chow and 
Siu Shee, immigrant couple from China. 
Born in Richmond, California, north 
of San Francisco, just across the bay. 

Named Fong Yuet for the ancestors. State- 
side she was June. To me, forever Mom. 
Fireworks the night before announced 
her arrival July fifth nineteen thirty. 

Every Independence Day she felt pangs 
of affirmative glee -- as if she belonged. 
At least to the sky. At nine she was sent 
to Chinese school in San Francisco, 

an immigrant custom she soon rejected. 
She hopped on the Greyhound bus alone, 
rode home to her parents’ chagrin. 
At Richmond Elementary she joined

the harmonica band, worked the restaurant 
after school, did not miss a shift. 
During wartime the family moved 
to the valley, where June was a big hit. 

Team debater, class treasurer, best-dressed 
girl at Merced High — she had it going on. 
Chinese pilots training at the air base 
lined up for her dance card. She tango’d, 

cha-cha’d, bunny hopped with gusto 
and soft laughter. Got a job downtown 
Merced selling ladies dresses. Took up with 
the owner who promised to promote her. 

Post-war, Gong Chow had made plans 
to return to China. The story goes June 
said NO, kept her little sister with her 
while the ship dipped off horizon.

June and sis stayed with Monroe, the now 
betrothed store owner. He promised 
her folks his good care but didn’t really 
follow through, so June then divorced him 

Though not before the three of us claimed 
her heart forever. Dave Allen was the next guy. 
With him she bore two more sons, of Chinese 
Irish extraction. Bridge clubs, soccer, 

cul-de-sacs filled her American sky. Especially 
on July fourth her urgent eyes scanned 
the night for oomph pah pah, or maybe 
something keener. By now we lived back 

by the bay. It was the flowered sixties. 
Her five young grew out their hair, 
while she and Dave plied the days 
with good times, hard work, harder drink. 

He died young, she carried on, the children 
ventured forth. Her last man was Ken Wilkins, 
though there were others in between - all this 
to say, she enjoyed the company of fellows. 

When Ken passed it hit her hard. The children 
couldn't save her. At sixty-two June was through. 
We sprinkled her at sea. I strike the gong. 
It rumbles wide, ripples up night sky. 


Where do the good, kindhearted go? 

To lipstick smiles 
left on napkins perfectly 
half stuck on rims 
where gin and tonics flowed 

Gliding long as fingertips 
that tucked me into cool 
crisp sheets in days when sleep 
was easy, a keeper 
of shy adorations 
nestled in young motherlove 

Arpege, Pall Malls, show 
tunes, novels, husbands 
in a row, loud laughing 
midnight parties 
turned to shouting 
or big whispers 
then to fragile mornings after 

Scrabble, dim sum, Niners,
grandkids 

Now to ashes dancing 
at the gate, not 
missing one last beat. 

© Deborah Jang. All Rights Reserved. 

Deborah Jang writes her way through the mysteries, perplexities, and joys of being human — on this planet, at this moment, in this skin. She is also a visual artist, engaging connection through forms and objects. She wanders between Denver, CO and Oceanside, CA; between mind and heart; between land and sea. She invites you to visit her website at deborahjang.com

Crow Quotes Revisited

by MariJo Moore

Many years ago, I had a premonition of starting a little publishing company, and so I did. Crow Quotes was the first book published by rENEGADE pLANETS pUBLISHING. This was in 1996. At the time, I was admonished for being a self-published writer; one well-known book reviewer refused to review my books because of this. My, my, how times have changed. I have always been a bit ahead of my time. (The first edition of the book was published on hemp.) 

So it goes. Through the past years I have written many other books: novels, poetry, fiction, non- fiction, and edited several anthologies of Indigenous writers, all which have been teachings and sharings. However, Crow Quotes has always come back to my mind, in bits and pieces of the quotes, reminding me so much about life. And by receiving, even recently, letters and emails from readers who relate how have they kept this little book by their side, relishing the quotes - some over twenty years. 

Several months ago I was given another premonition - it was time to offer Crow Quotes again. Time for the book to expand and reach out into the world in a new format. And so I have. Thus, Crow Quotes Revisited. 

Sample of quotes:

"Keep in mind you are a part of the whole. 
 The future is planted within you." 

"Want to confuse a crow? 
Try explaining human religions." 

Cover art by noted Pueblo artist Virgi Ortiz. 

For more info and to order, please visit www.marijomoore.com/booksandart.html 

Thank you for supporting an independently owned company. 

MariJo Moore 
www.marijomoore.com

Art Works

by Robert Bensen

            Sara Bates, “Honoring Circle” (sculpture)

            1

            Before a shop built downtown sealed over a spring and a little creek,

excavation turned up the bones of a man, his pipe and some shards of clay

            that came from this embankment above the Susquehanna—

clay that made the brick that made the shop that hides the creek

            that flows through pipe that’s made with clay that made the pipe they dug

beside the man they found not long ago, long after he had turned to clay.

            2

If spirit lives in everything and everything in spirit

            then the young woman with a virus raging in the head

who has fallen asleep beside Sarah's “Honoring Circle” while the rest write

            may have dreamed herself one day as pleasant as this

beside a pretty little creek above a bluff and drank from its talkative source

            in the warmth of a complicated sun, an agitated sun

flaring with seeds and pods and leaves and shells and petals,

            a composed sun from whose center the crossed roads carry

what they always carry down their seven shining paths

            until the red sun of evening stripes her face

and she flutters awake to find herself alone

            with this work, this disk of gifts on the floor, walk about

and wonder what on earth she saw in it, and what she sees. 

 An excerpt from Before by Robert Bensen

© Robert Bensen. All rights. Reserved.

Robert Bensen has published six collections of poetry, including Orenoque, Wetumka & Other Poems, and Before. His work has earned an NEA poetry fellowship, the Robert Penn Warren Award, the Harvard Summer Poetry Prize, and Illinois Arts Council and NY State Council on the Arts awards. His scholarship in the Caribbean and Native America has produced essays, studies, and editions, won fellowships from the NEH and Newberry Library, and led to teaching in St. Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela. He is the editor of Children of the Dragonfly: Native American Voices on Child Custody and Education. He is Emeritus Professor of English at Hartwick College (1978-2017).  He teaches at SUNY-Oneonta, and conducts a poetry workshop at Bright Hill Literary Center, Treadwell.

www.robertbensen.com

How Turtle Got Her Shell

by Jenny L. Davis 

Did you know 
Turtle 
didn’t always have 
a shell? 
She grew it 
to keep 
from being crushed 
fortifying 
her own body 
ribs 
vertebrae 
clavicle 
into carapace and plastron 
learning a whole 
new way to 
breath to 
walk to 
live 
to protect 
her from 
predators. 
She knew 
safety 
requires strength 
survival 
means fortifying 
softness 

© Jenny L. Davis. All rights reserved. 

Jenny L. Davis (Chickasaw) is a Two-Spirit/queer Indigenous writer and professor of American Indian Studies and Anthropology. Her creative work has been featured in literary journals including the Santa Ana River Review; Transmotion; Anomaly; Broadsided; and as well as anthologies such as As/Us; Raven Chronicles; and Resist Much/Obey Little: Inaugural Poems to the Resistance. 

Author of Talking Indian: Identity and Language Revitalization in the Chickasaw Renaissance (The University of Arizona Press). uapress.arizona.edu/book/talking-indian