The News from Jim Hanlen's "November Foothills"

 

SO MUCH NEWS IN YOUR

NOVEMBER FOOT HILLS POEM,

          --for Jim Hanlen

Tocayo—Mention corn tassels

and Navajo Medicine Bundles

blossom Blessingway. Rain here

washes snowfall into the Yakima,

it’s 72 degrees in town three

weeks before solstice. Did

that squeaking back gate freeze?

Chessmen you put on that postcard--

Queen and Bishop appear bitching at the King.

the Knight getting intimate with the pawn.

Nanapush, Ojibwe elder in Erdrich’s

Little No Horse distracts the priest, asking

Who are you? only to finish the match:

Ginitum, he says, It’s over, while dreaming

passes in the mail without detection.

Corn tassels woven into dinner mats

make me weep while Karen says grace.

Jim

1 December 2021