Five Poems
Filleting Salmon is Political Act
For Janice Mirikitani
my kitchen island scrubbed clean as an operating
table, filet knives arranged, I pull a spring chinook
from the Coleman, already gutted, still weighing
me down for a moment before a scaly glide, liberated
from my grasp, from my counter, no hook can catch
this salmon arching as if air was water, as if my
kitchen was the sea, mist of boiling water was cloud
I wait for a flop on my kitchen floor, I recover salmon’s
black skin, orange flesh, white bone, piece by piece
inside white veined innards, across my granite island
spreads scent of salt water, cut against the grain
salmon returned for generations, carrying peace
from its Pacific into cut bank rivers, you know
we are related, but not in the way you think, only
a line as thin as the contour of salmon flesh
it is all that divides you and I
Internment
when they took your homes, your furniture, your name off the door
I cried for you, even though we fought bitterly when you first arrived
I cried because I knew what it was to have your home taken, roar
of howitzer on the next hill, we like you fled in daylight, strove
to find another way to keep ceremony, to feed kin, we tried
if it ever worked, forgetting was a certain kind of blessing or
a curse. I never knew the verse of that hymn they sang, when we cried
as you bravely boarded that train to windblown desert, there shivering
you made space in the barn they gave you, made walls from sheets
whispered stories in Japanese to your children, hummed nursery rhymes
to throw them off your scent, though doctors and engineers you manually dug
trenches to make canals, bringing water so we could grow vegetables
you changed our lives; you made some things better even in your sad-
ness, friend, I prayed in my way that someday we will meet
Women Friends
Fumi crochets yellow daisies for a baby blanket, it was the mid 1960s
in the new state of Hawaii, my brown skin like yours unites us
though our ancestors are an ocean apart, you teach sophomores, I teach freshmen
my baby will know your name when she is grown, when she looks for you
on the internet, she will think of this crocheted blanket in a chest, wrapped in paper
the radio that day played Hawaiian guitar and western swing, we had never
heard of the Beatles, sensation that they were, they couldn’t cross our ocean
not yet anyway, the rhythm that mattered was carried by our Pacific waves
I dream of you crocheting sunflowers while I sleep in my rainforest
on the mainland’s West Coast, clouds keep the light as far away as you seem
though only my daughter is left of me here on this earth, she longs for you
Pacific Rim
we are related, though not as you were told
there was no bridge, only ice for miles, we slid back and forth
our connection was made in salt water, it carries an electric charge
we traveled in our cedar canoes, dug out of the towering cedar
tree flesh, stretched by burning rocks and boiling water that
prepared us for the churning ocean that the ancients knew, we sailed
into tomorrow, you sailed into your yesterday
you reached our rocky coastline on sailing ships
we called to each like cousins, like children your presence gave us joy
our journeys took so long that we stayed for years, made friends, made babies
our ties forged on this volcanic rim of earth, bowl of the sea
salt water in our blood, we are not the same, but we are close enough
that even now, so many years since, so many struggles, we find ourselves friends
My Friend
Shizuko has tea ceremony in the dry lands of Santa Fe
she wears her bright red flower kimono and sandals
grains of sand burn her feet, this Tokyo native has lived for years
in the desert heat, the tea she still orders from Japan
I am rich because I am her friend, in Japan she fed
me green tea ice cream parfaits, we ate sushi though I ordered more rice
we laughed at our own biases, our habits, so Japanese, so American
the hydrangeas in Tokyo awakened me to delicate light of this ancient city
Shizuko talked about the ones that only grow in walled temple gardens
light blue Tibetan jade beads from the flea market remind me of the days
I tried to write haiku while Shizuko made me laugh
Kara Briggs is a Sauk-Suiattle tribal citizen. She was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, when her parents taught high school from 1964 to 1966. She has been a journalist, consulted for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in its first decade on the National Mall, and now works at Ecotrust, a non-profit that has invested its New Market Tax Credits in the Molokaʻi Land Trust. Kara recently completed her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the Institute of American Indian Art, and previously completed her Master of Public/Tribal Administration from The Evergreen State College. She holds a BA in English from Whitworth University and lives on the Tulalip Reservation north of Seattle, Washington. Her debut poetry book, Rivers in My Veins, was recently published by Saint Julian Press.