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Keintpoos
- University of Pittsburgh Press
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• 113 keintpoos I wanted to live in Keintpoos’ cave of wives. To lie down with him in his bed. I wanted to lie down and die Above me against the sky you called me back. I didn’t want to live when they hanged him. We wandered east along the border of our two states. Looking for the Falls of the Klamath, drove through the Labyrinth of Lava. Hiked down the River of Rocks to their stronghold, the last stand of the Modoc. A child stared out from the cave. Damp, pitch black. It was then I would have traded all my woman rights, everything to live those four and a half months in there with him. A woman sat on the open ledge when you pointed west to the Ridge where the Army gathered and camped. Mt. Shasta went behind the sky. Further inside three more. Then suddenly the cave filled with them. I knew envy. The Klamath flows from where the Falls were dynamited, the land reclaimed. Where DDT drains the Tule, where salmon. Where herons, pelicans, grebes, gulls. Where deer. Where Spring is silent. Where you won’t know why this Hell, where you say you can’t. It’s too much pain, too daunting but dare to ponder why Captain Jack did it. Still see all sides and claim you love me. • 114 Where can we go now Love but into the collapsed tubes into the confluence of poisons? Into this ancient eruption. Into his cave further back where his sons wait. I study the photo the day before he is hanged. Yes. I’m in love with him. The day they are shipped to Oklahoma. I keep making love with you to make his babies. I’d give my life for you to know how bad. This man hanging from the cave opening over us. This child hanging. Our child to be hanged. ...