Advice to a young Indian Agent:
This country will not cradle the eye.
Lope through a buffalo wallow
with only your head
lolling above ground like a specter.
Flickering swish of your mare’s chestnut tail.
Note the map:
Indian Territory—no less than six times the breadth
of Ohio, and who can say we failed
to provide for these souls
in anything less than a Christian manner?
Do not neglect your letters to the missionary ladies’ tea societies.
You cannot imagine how hard
it is to juice a bit of knowledge
from these people. First,
you must know
that an Indian baby is named
for his clan
which is generally some wild beast.
Take this new boy
from the mission school,
pushing a broom in the corner.
Now, this child was born to the panther clan
in late winter
when it is assumed that every animal is starving.
So you see, there is the reference to the beast
and the moon of the boy’s birth.
As the child grows, so too the name.
If swift, he could become Running Panther,
If thoughtful, Panther in Winter.
Alone, the new Agent
pulls a finger of whiskey slowly into his mouth—
firm amber handshake
and turns aside as if addressing a friend.
No cradles for the fucking eye.
Across the threshold stands
the boy’s father
come down to the agency from the Salt Flats
with a string of broke horses to sell.
Clatter of the broom
as the boy
darts out the door and into his arms.
To be swung chuckling onto a yearling’s back.
That boy is Starving Panther.
When will the boy’s name change?
The Agent hollers from the mission stoop.
The father levels a cool stare.
His name is William, sir.
