#Laura Tohe
Text
A member of the Miami tribe.
The Miami people, are a Native American nation, originally speaking one of the Algonquian languages. Among the peoples known as the Great Lakes tribes, it occupied territory, that is now identified as Indiana, southwest Michigan, and western Ohio.
By 1846, most of the Miami had been removed, to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma). The Miami Tribe of Oklahoma, is the only federally recognized tribe of Miami Indians, in the United States. The Miami Nation of Indiana, is an unrecognized tribe
(Cherokee Indian Native)
* * * *
That Thursday afternoon when I was getting dressed for work,
the newspaper landed with
a dull thud on the steps.
It must have
kicked up the dust a little.
And as I combed out my hair, my mom
came across the paragraph:
‘Young male Indian
in the early 20’s found alongside the highway
near Twin Lakes.’
My God, it was on a Greyhound bus in Durango
that I first told you I loved you.
The girl who sat behind us must’ve heard me
make such bold
confessions
through the space between the seats.
Then in silence I fell asleep on your lap.
You must’ve watched me
dream the La Plata Mountains alone.
The words I uttered weren't enough to keep you.
The night we clung together
rejected us
and now your life had erupted all over the
highway.
“Body Identified”, by Navajo author Laura Tohe
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Japanese Garden | Laura Tohe
–Navajo poet
After a stone and sand exhibit in Portland
A man is leading the animals.
A man is leading the ones that float on water.
A man is leading the winged ones.
A man is leading the ones that swim.
Maybe he’s St. Francis,
the long-robed man who calls the animals to him now.
Maybe he’s Noah,
the one who gathered the animals.
and sailed away with them, they say.
Who was there to…
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#Laura Tohe#native american heritage month#native american heritage month 2023#native poets#Poem#poet#Poetry
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hi! first i want to thank you for answering questions about native cultures. next i wonder if you or your followers know of any navajo fiction authors? or books that focus on navajo mc/people. i tried to look myself but i seem to get nowhere so any help is appreciated please? :( thank you so much in advance
Navajo authors with Navajo Main characters:
Rebecca Roanhorse (Trail of Lightning)
A.A Carr (The Eye Killers)
Luci Tapahonso
Laura Tohe (Pheonix Noir)
Authors who are not Navajo but have Navajo main characters:
Anne Hillerman
R. Allen Chappell
Aimee & David Thurlo
Tower Howe
& that's all I know!
#i cannot speak for the quality or cultural sensitivity for the second category so proceed with caution & critical mind#anonymous
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“For Kathryn” by Laura Tohe
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That Thursday afternoon when I was getting dressed for work,the newspaper landed with a dull thud on the steps.
It must have
kicked up the dust a little.
And as I combed out my hair, my mom
came across the paragraph:
'Young male Indian
in the early 20's found alongside the highway near Twin Lakes.'
My God, it was on a Greyhound bus in Durango
that I first told you I loved you.
The girl who sat behind us must've heard me make such bold
confessions
through the space between the seats.
Then in silence I fell asleep on your lap.
You must've watched me
dream the La Plata Mountains alone.
The words I uttered weren't enough to keep you.
The night we clung together
rejected us
and now your life had erupted all over the highway.
“Body Identified”, by Navajo author Laura Tohe
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Day 3183 - Laura Tohe https://www.instagram.com/p/CMBP2OAH23z/?igshid=18exgt1kxsjcq
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Today’s entry in the poetry journal. Laura Tohe is the current poet laureate for the Navajo Nation. Writing the bottom translation was TOUGH, but important to include out of respect for the poet and the poem. It was almost like a 20 minute space of mediation as I put all my focus on trying to copy it correctly, which I almost did. Haha. Still a few mistakes.
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Returning - Laura Tohe
I’ve been somewhere. My mind struggles to remember the cornfields and fruit trees blooming like a young woman’s body and the place where my brothers built the shade house for our sister’s marriage beneath the slender moon where my mother wove her last blanket.
I’ve walked this empty road before in the month of the big harvest when The People left the canyon with wagons loaded with peaches and corn to take to relatives and to trade with our neighbors who live on the high windy mesas.
I am returning to the red rocks that once cradled us and from whose arms we were torn when death marched in, surrounded us, and slaughtered everything that we loved.
I am the kidnapped one and survived to escape the enemy who feared our graceful lives because we know that Beauty cannot be captured with words or jails.
I hold nothing in my hands except the lines that tell my fate. I long for the comfort of my mother’s stories, cooking, anything. How she roasted mutton ribs crispy and salty. Her stories of my Amazon grandmothers who claimed and discarded husbands like ashes.
Dust clouds billow beneath my bare feet. The ground feels familiar, and I walk easily on the sand that flows from the mouth of the canyon. A crow glides a new pattern in the wake of grief’s echoes.
Thick black ants watch Earth-Surface child return. “Ahhh,” they say, “leave this one alone; she is returning from that place.
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(a partial continuation of this post)
This is a mostly complete list of non-fiction books I have read about WWII, semi-categorized. A lot of these are first person accounts, but not all. I recommend them all, though a couple with a bit of caution (namely, these being real accounts of real people, some situations and discussions deal with some unpleasant topics - and I mean beyond the obvious warfare and Holocaust ones) - if anyone wants details or has questions, please ask and I will answer as best as memory serves.
This is by no means a complete list of books you should read if you are interested in the subject, but merely a list of ones I have read and think worth a mention. Also, although I have categorized as best I can, a lot of the books have overlap in more than one category, and some books maybe categorized under one subheading for lack of a more specific one.
This post will be frequently edited (I currently have two WWII books out from the library and one or two more I recently purchased). Asterisks indicate cross-posting between categories.
Resistance Work:
Code Name Christine Clouet by Claire Chevrillion
An American Heroine in the French Resistance: the Diary and Memoir of Virginia d’Albert-Lake by Virginia d’Albert-Lake
For Freedom by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
Sky by Hanneke Ippisch
The Boys Who Challenged Hitler: Knud Pedersen and the Churchill Club by Philip Hoose
Things We Couldn’t Say by Diet Eman and James Schaap
Hitler’s Savage Canary by David Lampe
A Train in Winter by Caroline Moorehead
The Zookeeper’s Wife by Diane Ackerman
Intelligence Work:
The Spies Who Never Were by Hervie Haufler
A Man Called Intrepid by William Stevenson
The Debs of Bletchley Park by Michael Smith
American Agent by Mark Gayn and John Caldwell*
The Holocaust:
We Are Witnesses by Jacob Boas
I Remember Nothing More by Adina Blady Szwajger
Life and Loss in the Shadow of the Holocaust by Rebecca Boehling and Uta Larkey
Until We Meet Again by Michal Korenblit and Kathleen Janger
The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom*
Night by Elie Wiesel
Irena’s Children by Tilar J. Mazzeo
The Fragility of Goodness by Tzvetan Toderov
I Will Plant You a Lilac Tree by by Laura Hillman
Elly: My True Story of the Holocaust by Elly Berkovits Gross
The Blessed Abyss by Nanda Herbermann*
Conscience & Courage by Eva Fogelman
Heroes of the Holocaust: True Stories of Rescues by Teens by Allan Zullo and Mara Bovsun
The Inextinguishable Symphony by Martin Goldsmith
The Boy on the Wooden Box by Leon Leyson
Hidden Accounts:
The Upstairs Room by Johanna Reiss
Clara’s War by Clara Kramer
The Nazi Officer’s Wife by Edith Hahn Beer*
Hidden Children of the Holocaust by Suzanne Vromen
The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom*
Twenty and Ten by Claire Huchet Bishop
Germany:
The Nazi Officer’s Wife by Edith Hahn Beer*
When I was a German by Christabel Bielenberg
Berlin Diaries, 1940-1945 by Marie Vassilitchikov
The Blessed Abyss by Nanda Herbermann*
A Higher Call by Adam Makos*
I Lived Under Hitler by Sybil Bannister
Non-US Military:
Dance with Death by Anne Noggle
Victory Harvest by Marion Kelsey*
A Higher Call by Adam Makos*
Wings, Women, & War by Reina Pennington
Unlikely Warrior: A Jewish Solder in Hitler’s Army by Georg Rauch
Women in the Second World War by Neil R. Storey and Molly Housego*
US Military:
A Higher Call by Adam Makos*
Code Talker Stories by Laura Tohe
Honoring Sergeant Carter by Allene G. Carter and Robert L. Allen
Lost in Shangri-La by Mitchell Zuckoff
The Boys of Winter by Charles J. Sanders
Frozen in Time by Mitchell Zuckoff
Mayhem was Our Business by Sabine R. Ulibarri
The Secret Rescue by Cate Lineberry*
Medic! by Robert J. Franklin
Ghosts in the Fog by Samantha Seiple*
Battle Station Sick Bay: Navy Medicine in World War II by Jan K. Herman*
Letters from the Pacific by Russell Cartwright Stroup
The Raft by Robert Trumball and Harold Dixon
Letters Home, edited by Mina Curtiss
The 52 Days by W. W. Chaplin
An Artist at War: The Journal of John Gaitha Browning by John Gaitha Browning, ed. by Oleta Stewart Toliver
Artist at War by George Biddle
Women in the US Military (includes WASPs):
Thank You, Uncle Sam by Eugenia M. Kierar
One Woman’s World War II by Violet A. Kochendoerfer
They Also Served by Olga Gruhitz-Hoyt
Navy WAVE: Memories of World War II by Lt. Helen Clifford Gunter
Winning My Wings by Marion Stegeman Hodgson
An Officer and a Lady by Lt. Col. Betty Bandel
Mother was a Gunner’s Mate by Josette Dermody Wingo
One Women’s War by Anne Bosanko Green
Army in Skirts by Frances DeBra Brown
Daughter of the Air: The Brief Soaring Life of Cornelia Fort by Rob Simbeck
To Serve My Country, to Serve My Race by Brenda L. Moore
Women Marines by Peter A. Sodebergh
Stateside Soldier by Aileen Kilgore Henderson
Fly Girls by P. O’Connell Pearson
Nurses in the US Military:
The Secret Rescue by Cate Lineberry*
We Band of Angels by Elizabeth M. Norman
American Nightingale: The Story of Frances Slanger, Forgotten Heroine of Normandy by Bob Welch
And If I Perish by Evelyn M. Monahan and Rosemary Neidel-Greenlee
No Time for Fear by Diane Burke Fessler
Pure Grit: How American World War II Nurses Survived Battle and Prison Camp in the Pacific by Mary Cronk Farrell
Battle Station Sick Bay: Navy Medicine in World War II by Jan K. Herman*
I was on Corregidor by Amea Willoughby* [account of Navy officer’s wife]
I Served on Bataan by Juanita Redmond
US Internments:
Making Home From War by Brian Komei Dempster
The Aleut Internments of World War II: Islanders Removed from Their Homes by Japan and the United States by Russell W. Estlack*
Heart Mountain by Mike Mackay
Women in Non-Military Work:
The Women Who Wrote the War by Nancy Caldwell Sorel
American Women in a World at War - Ed. by Judy Litoff and David Smith
The Girls of Atomic City by Denise Kiernan
Victory Harvest by Marion Kelsey*
I was on Corregidor by Amea Willoughby* [account of Navy officer’s wife]
Last Letters from Attu by Mary Brew*
Women in the Second World War by Neil R. Storey and Molly Housego*
Japan:
The Aleut Internments of World War II: Islanders Removed from Their Homes by Japan and the United States by Russell W. Estlack*
The Girl with the White Flag by Tomiko Higa
Ghosts in the Fog by Samantha Seiple*
Attu Boy by Nick Golodoff
Last Letters from Attu by Mary Brew*
Miscellaneous:
Wrong Passport by Ralph Brewster
Journey for Margaret by W. L. White
Honorable Mentions (stories not specifically about WWII but with with parts covering them):
The Trapp Family Singers by Maria Augusta Trapp
The Flying Scotsman by Sally Magnusson
The Woman Who Smashed Codes: A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine who Outwitted America’s Enemies by Jason Fagone
War Letters edited by Andrew Carroll
*Cross-posted between categories
(Last edited 12/17/2021)
#WWII#history#book recommendation#books#This is partly for my own record and partly for a couple of folks who have asked/may be interested
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[TASK 055: THE NAVAJO]
Shout out to @olivaraofrph for inspiring and helping compile this task! There’s a masterlist below compiled of over 220+ Navajo faceclaims categorised by gender with their occupation and ethnicity denoted if there was a reliable source. With 300,460 enrolled members as of 2015, the Navajo is disputed with the Cherokee to either be the largest or second largest federally recognized tribe in the United States. If you want an extra challenge use random.org to pick a random number! Of course everything listed below are just suggestions and you can pick whichever character or whichever project you desire.
Any questions can be sent here and all tutorials have been linked below the cut for ease of access! REMEMBER to tag your resources with #TASKSWEEKLY and we will reblog them onto the main! This task can be tagged with whatever you want but if you want us to see it please be sure that our tag is the first five tags!
THE TASK - scroll down for FC’s!
STEP 1: Decide on a FC you wish to create resources for! You can always do more than one but who are you starting with? There are links to masterlists you can use in order to find them and if you want help, just send us a message and we can pick one for you at random!
STEP 2: Pick what you want to create! You can obviously do more than one thing, but what do you want to start off with? Screencaps, RP icons, GIF packs, masterlists, PNG’s, fancasts, alternative FC’s - LITERALLY anything you desire!
STEP 3: Look back on tasks that we have created previously for tutorials on the thing you are creating unless you have whatever it is you are doing mastered - then of course feel free to just get on and do it. :)
STEP 4: Upload and tag with #TASKSWEEKLY! If you didn’t use your own screencaps/images make sure to credit where you got them from as we will not reblog packs which do not credit caps or original gifs from the original maker.
THINGS YOU CAN MAKE FOR THIS TASK - examples are linked!
Stumped for ideas? Maybe make a masterlist or graphic of your favourite Navajo faceclaims. A masterlist of names. Plot ideas or screencaps from a music video preformed by a Navajo artist. Masterlist of quotes and lyrics that can be used for starters, thread titles or tags. Guides on Navajo culture and customs.
Screencaps
RP icons [of all sizes]
Gif Pack [maybe gif icons if you wish]
PNG packs
Manips
Dash Icons
Character Aesthetics
PSD’s
XCF’s
Graphic Templates - can be chara header, promo, border or background PSD’s!
FC Masterlists - underused, with resources, without resources!
FC Help - could be related, family templates, alternatives.
Written Guides.
and whatever else you can think of / make!
MASTERLIST!
Ladies:
Geraldine Keams (65) Navajo - actress.
Luci Tapahonso (63) Navajo - poet.
Freda J. Nells (20 as of 1979) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Elizabeth Woody (born 1959) Tenino, Navajo, Yakama, Wasco-Wishram, and Chinook - author.
Laura Tohe (born 1952) Navajo - author.
Audra Aviso (19 as of 1985) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Melanie Yazzie (born in 1966) Navajo - artist.
Wena Jesus (24 as of 1987) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Karen Leuppe (23 as of 1994) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Sharon Watson Murray (18 as of 1991) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Victoria Yazzie (42) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Audra J. Etsitty Platero (41) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Rhonda Tree-Mangan (born 1976) Navajo - model and blogger.
Sevaleah Begay (39) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Shaunda Mae Tsosie (23 as of 2002) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Sydney Freeland (36) Navajo and Scottish - filmmaker. - Trans!
Onawa Lacy (35) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Marla Billey (20 as of 2003) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Jonathea Tso (25 as of 2007) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Jocelyn Billy (24 as of 2006) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Deanne Jean VanWinkle (34) Navajo - model and makeup artist.
Rachelle James (20 as of 2005) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Cheyenne De Herrera (32) Navajo - model.
Carol Lee Jefferson (31) Navajo and Southern Ute - model.
Crystalyne Curley (25 as of 2011) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Leandra Thomas (25 as of 2012) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Yolanda Charley (20 as of 2008) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Jhene Aiko (29) Japanese, Dominican (African and Spanish), Yaqui (Unconfirmed), Choctaw (Unconfirmed), Cherokee (Unconfirmed), Navajo (Unconfirmed), and German Jewish (Unconfirmed) - singer-songwriter.
Winifred Bessie Jumbo (22 as of 2010) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Vonica Kaskalla (27) Navajo - model and actress.
Raytanna Williams (28) Navajo - model.
Natasha Hardy (24 as of 2013) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
McKeon Kova Dempsey (24 as of 2014) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Tashina Nelson (19 as of 2009) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Sage Honga (born 1992) Navajo, Hopi, and Hualapai - model.
Tatianna Olivia (24) Navajo - model.
Nizhoni Cooley (24) Navajo, Mexican, Irish, and Czechoslovakian - Instagrammer (nizhonicooley).
Tekayle Bitsilly (22) Navajo - model.
Siera Begaye (22) Navajo - model and fashion designer.
Gabby Tsosie (22) Navajo - model.
Ronda Joe (22) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Alyson Jeri Shirley (20 as of 2015) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Hon’mana Seukteoma (21) Tohono O’odham, Hopi, and Navajo - YouTuber (Seukteoma).
Emily Sera (21) Navajo, Western Shoshone, and Venezuelan (Unspecified Indigenous, Spanish, and Irish) - actress and YouTuber (Emily Sera).
Connie Brownotter (21) Navajo and Hunkpapa Lakota Sioux - Instagrammer (conniebrownotter).
Camille Manybeads Tso (13 as of 2009) Navajo - filmmaker, actress, and musician.
DeShawna Begay (19) Navajo - model.
Magdalena Begay (14) Navajo - actress.
Candice Costello (?) Navajo - actress.
Tash Terry (?) Navajo - musician (Indigie Femme).
Gloria Dodge (?) Navajo - actress.
Sahar Khadjenoury (?) Navajo and Iranian - actress and model.
Serene Hedin (?) Navajo - actress and producer.
Morningstar Angeline (?) Navajo, Blackfoot, Chippewa Cree, Mexican, and Unspecified White - actress.
Carmen Moore (?) Navajo - actress. - Trans!
Vtora Quimayousie (?) Navajo and Dutch - model.
Diana Ashley (?) Navajo - model.
Rhonda “Honey” Duvall (?) Navajo - rapper.
Khrissy Enditio (?) Navajo - model.
Katrina Kavanaugh (?) Navajo - actress.
Andrea Good (?) Navajo, Apache, and Zia - actress.
Monika Crowfoot (?) Navajo - actress.
Trina Secody (?) Navajo - model.
Lady Xplicit (?) Navajo - rapper.
Deirdre Begay (?) Navajo - model.
Makayah Crowfoot (?) Blackfoot, Navajo, Oneida, Irish, Armenian, English, and French - actress.
GiGi Sands (?) Navajo - model.
Lynntelle Slim (?) Navajo - model.
Shishonia Livingston (?) Navajo - comedian, writer, and actress.
Lena Carr (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Sharon Burch (?) Navajo and German - musician.
Sarah Del Seronde (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Tylah Nez (?) Navajo - model.
Cherish Arviso (?) Navajo - model.
Volanjayia Canuto (?) Navajo - model.
Nicole Lee Smith (?) Navajo, Haida, and Tlingit - actress.
Owee Rae (?) Navajo - model.
Lady Yazzie (?) Navajo, Ojibwe, Zuni, and German - model, vlogger, and dancer.
Allison Young (?) Navajo - actress.
Vera Saganitso-Thompson (?) Navajo - model.
Pamela J. Peters (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Cheyenne Yazza (?) Navajo - model.
Tsailii Rogers (?) Navajo - actress and producer.
Sharon Anne Henderson (?) Navajo, Mexican, and Basque - actress.
Radmilla Cody (?) Navajo and African-American - singer and model.
Kahara Hodges (?) Navajo - singer.
Jeneda Benally (?) Navajo - singer and bassist.
Tiinesha Begaye (?) Navajo and Syilx - musician.
Carla DuBois (?) Navajo - musician.
Katonya Begay (?) Navajo - model.
April Brannon Yazza (?) Navajo and Zuni - beauty pageant titleholder.
Shaylin Shabi (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Brittney Jackson (?) Navajo - model.
Allie Young (?) Navajo - actress.
Sheila Hollow Horn (?) Navajo and Oglala Lakota Sioux - actress and model.
Krystal McCabe (?) Navajo - model.
Writtyn (?) Navajo - rapper.
Delilah Morgan (?) Navajo - model.
Clarissa Yazzie (?) Navajo - actress.
Kristina Jacobsen (?) Navajo - singer-songwriter.
Talibah Begay (?) Navajo - singer.
Geri Camarillo (?) Navajo - actress.
Clarissa Carlson (?) Navajo - model.
Brandi Smith Charley (?) Navajo - model and YouTuber (WaaavyNativeBaby).
Jaylene Reid (?) Navajo - model.
Rhiana Yazzie (?) Navajo - playwright and filmmaker.
Jannalee Atcitty (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
ShiRee Joe (?) Navajo and Ute - model.
Desiree Belone (?) Navajo and Japanese - model and makeup artist.
Josephine Tracey (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Ramona Emerson (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Arlene Bowman (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Tara Tsosie (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Tina James-Tafoya (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Jennifer Jackson Wheeler (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Geraldine Gamble (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Jaylin Tochoney (?) Navajo - model.
Sofina Shorty Brown (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Diane Taylor (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Taj Passion (?) Navajo - actress and model.
Lorene Lewis (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Shirley Paulson (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Dolly Manson Montoya (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Sandra Eriacho (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Sunny Dooley (?) Navajo - beauty pageant titleholder.
Ashley Smith (?) Navajo - actress and model. (Common name so recommend going straight to instagram and following links from there: lifeofash10.)
Male:
R. Carlos Nakai (71) Navajo and Ute - musician.
Craig Chaquico (64) Navajo - musician.
Roger Willie (born 1964) Navajo - actor.
Jack Soto (born 1965) Navajo and Puerto Rican - ballet dancer.
Scott Means (51) Navajo, Oglala Lakota Sioux, and Omaha - actor.
Ernest Tsosie III (born April 1967) Navajo - actor and comedian.
Jay Tavare (46) White Mountain Apache, Navajo - actor and blogger
Cory Witherill (45) Navajo - NASCAR driver.
J. LaRose (44) Navajo - actor.
Sherwin Bitsui (born 1974) Navajo - poet.
James Iron Moccasin (39 as of 2013) Navajo - model.
Rick Mora (42) Yaqui, Apache, and Navajo - actor and model.
Klee Benally (born October 1975) Navajo - singer and guitarist.
Raven Chacon (born December 1977) Navajo - musician and composer
Rodney Smith (39) Navajo - actor.
Jeremy Ray Valdez (36) Navajo and Mexican - actor.
Jacoby Ellsbury (33) Navajo, English, and German - MLB player.
Tatanka Means (32) Navajo, Oglala Lakota Sioux, and Omaha - actor.
Brian Lee Young (30) Navajo - model.
Rickie Fowler (28) Navajo, Japanese, and English - olympic golfer.
Nakotah LaRance (27) Hopi, Tewa, Nakoda Sioux, and Navajo - actor.
Lex Jaymes (25 as of 2012) Navajo - model.
Nataanii Means (26) Navajo, Oglala Lakota Sioux, and Omaha - rapper.
Christian Baste (22) Navajo and Oglala Lakota Sioux - actor.
N8ve Narrow (born 1995) Navajo - rapper.
Jamison Long (20) Navajo, Chinese, and Afro Mexican - actor. Also known as JJ Long.
Forrest Goodluck (18) Navajo, Hidasta, Mandan, and Tsimshian - actor.
Quinton Kien (13) Navajo - actor.
DJ Rey Love (?) Navajo and Filipino - musician.
Pete Sands (?) Navajo - singer-songwriter.
Jon Begay (?) Navajo - musician.
Robert D. Shorty (?) Navajo - actor.
Jermaine Sam (?) Navajo - YouTuber (Jermaine Sam).
Kelly Bedoni (?) Navajo - blogger.
Arkie Benally (?) Navajo - singer.
Kyerin Bennett (?) Navajo - model.
Jordan “Rude Boy Lice” Steele (?) Navajo - singer and guitarist.
Martin “Panda” Johnson (?) Navajo - bassist.
Aaron White (?) Navajo - flutist.
Keanu “Popeye” Lee (?) Navajo - singer and guitarist.
Andre “Dre” Alva (?) Navajo - drummer.
Jon Riggs (?) Navajo - actor and model.
Arthur Redcloud (?) Navajo - actor.
Jeremiah Bitsui (?) Navajo and Omaha - actor.
Rog Benally (?) Navajo - actor.
DJ Smog (?) Navajo - musician.
Levi Platero (?) Navajo - musician.
Keithan Richards (?) Navajo - singer-songwriter.
Wallace Book (?) Navajo - musician.
Makardi (?) Navajo - rapper.
Sick 2da Rick (?) Navajo - rapper.
Douglas Platero (?) Navajo - musician.
James Junes (?) Navajo and Hopi - comedian.
Bronson Begay (?) Navajo - musician.
Clayson Benally (?) Navajo - musician.
Franklin Yazzie (?) Navajo - musician.
Robert I. Mesa (?) Navajo - actor.
Kevin Nez (?) Navajo - rapper.
Natay (?) Navajo - rapper.
Def-i (?) Navajo - rapper.
Douglas C. Begay (?) Navajo - rapper.
Joseph Valdez (?) Navajo and Spanish - actor.
Loren Anthony (?) Navajo - actor.
Larry Yazzie (?) Navajo - actor.
Vince Redhouse (?) Navajo - flutist.
Ryan Begay (?) Navajo - actor.
Wambli Eagleman (?) Lakota Sioux and Navajo - actor.
Dallas Goldtooth (?) Mdewakanton Dakota Sioux and Navajo - member of comedy group, the 1491s.
Vic Buildsafire (?) Navajo, Pomo, Aztec, and Spanish - rapper.
Perry “Cheevers” Toppah (?) Navajo and Kiowa - musician.
N8v Ace (?) Navajo - rapper.
Jay Begaye (?) Navajo - musician.
Thomas Arviso (?) Navajo - musician.
Edsel Pete (?) Navajo - actor.
Kody Dayish (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Larry Blackhorse Lowe (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
DJ Young Native (?) Navajo - rapper.
Dylan McLaughlin (?) Navajo - musician.
TheFly (?) Navajo - musician (ShitOuttaLuck).
Lazer (?) Navajo - musician (ShitOuttaLuck).
Tuco (?) Navajo - musician (ShitOuttaLuck).
Rattlesnake (?) Navajo - musician (ShitOuttaLuck).
Hansen Ashley (?) Navajo - musician (The Discotays).
Leon Garcia (?) Navajo and Acoma - model, actor, and musician.
Billy Luther (?) Navajo, Hopi, and Laguna - film producer and director.
Jeff Barehand (?) Navajo and Unspecified South Asian - actor.
Milford Calamity (?) Navajo - model.
Brian Young (?) Navajo - model.
Christopher Nataanii Cegielski (?) Navajo - filmmaker.
Derek Roy (?) Navajo - model.
Roger Benally (?) Navajo - actor, model, and dancer.
Patrick Spencer (?) Navajo - model.
Dustinn Craig (?) Navajo and White Mountain Apache - filmmaker.
Craig Littleman (?) Navajo - model and professional baseball player.
Verlin George (?) Navajo - model.
NB:
Brad Charles (?) - Two Spirit - Navajo - punk rock musician (The Discotays) and co-founder of Bands In Action.
Mike J. Marin (?) - Two Spirit - Navajo, Laguna, Washoe, and Mexican - actor, rapper, and filmmaker.
Nitasha Manning (?) - Two Spirit - Navajo - artist.
Demian DinéYazhi (?) - Two Spirit - artist and poet.
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Female Rain | Laura Tohe
#nativeamericanheritagemonth
–Navajo poet
Female Rain
Dancing from the south
cloudy cool and gray
pregnant with rainchild
At dawn she gives birth to a gentle mist
flowers bow with wet sustenance
luminescence all around
Níłtsą́ Bi’áád
Níłtsą́ bi’áád
Shá’di’ááhdę́ę’go dah naaldogo’ alzhish
k’ós hazlį́į́’
honeezk’ází
níltsą́ bi’áád bitázhool bijooltsą́
áádóó níłtsą́ bi’áád biyázhí…
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#featured#Laura Tohe#native american heritage month#native american heritage month 2022#native poets#Poem#poet#Poetry
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A light I can reflect from me to them
From The Power of Story
Arizona State University Turning Points Magazine
In the Fall 2018 semester at Arizona State University, the Turning Points team approached our storyboard and asked, “How can we shed light on ASU’s amazing Indigenous faculty and staff?” The answer to that question was a section within our content titled “Faculty Highlight.” One of the two faculty highlighted in the Fall 2018 is renowned poet Natalie Diaz, where she highlights her advice to Native American college students on seeking mentorship, the notion of visibility, and “acts of resistance” as an Indigenous being.
Congratulations on being named one of the 25 winners of this year’s MacArthur Foundation fellowships. What does this fellowship mean to you as an Indigenous, Latinx and queer woman, and what does it mean to Indigenous communities?
Natalie Diaz: Gracias for the congratulations. It has been a lucky set of months. I am still realizing what it means to me. I think it means connection — not so much a connection to me, I am the least of it. What I mean is that I think it gives people a way to begin connecting the many Indigenous women who are doing meaningful and powerful work in Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. When I was in junior high school my aunt was tribal chairperson of our Mojave tribe and I worked alongside Grace Thorpe to fight a nuclear waste dump on the reservation where I grew up, Fort Mojave. So this maybe means most to my communities, a light I can reflect from me to them, because I am part of a long line of strong, intelligent, and imaginative women. I was raised at Fort Mojave but I am enrolled at Gila River. (Shout out to District 3.)
What role does Indigenous languages play in your life?
Diaz: Indigenous language is more than a role, it is a blood in me, a river. It is who I am. It is always who I have been, even when the language was quiet in me, before I learned to bring it out, before I had the luck of so many teachers, in particular my uncle and teacher Hubert McCord. I am more “me“ now that I have my language. English was designed to let me be only a part of myself. Now that I have my other languages, including Spanish and Makav (Mojave), I am the most me, and closer to the person I am still becoming. My language makes me strong in the ways that it has made my people strong for hundreds of years, since it was first given to us.
You are an award-winning poet, linguist and essayist who holds many recognition and awards under your belt. You also teach in the Creative Writing MFA program at ASU- what has your experience been in teaching on the traditional homelands of the Akimel O’otham and Pee Posh peoples?
Diaz: These are my homelands. I am enrolled at Gila River, and also Mojave. I am walking in the energies and storylands of my people. This is where I dream best, where I think best, and where I am strongest. It is important for people to know this land and the people who were built up from this land, as well as the language this land formed and the water that this land gave birth to. They are all connected — body, land, water.
You have previously talked about “the power of story and the necessity of stories to make us visible.” Writing our stories may be difficult truths to confront and discuss with others- what advice would you pass onto students who wish to incorporate truth into their work?
Diaz: I think it’s important to know that truth belongs to each one of us, and so it will look different to each one of us. But know that ASU is a place full of people and instructors who are here to make space for you to tell your stories. I believe that ASU is a place where you can contribute to the future that only you can make possible here, a better future. There is not future of America without acknowledging and heeding the knowledges and wisdoms of Natives of these lands and waters.
Your work discusses the importance of visibility. On October 26th, Native people took to Twitter to discuss how invisibility is a modern form of racism and used the hashtags #NativeTwitter, #WeAreStillHere, #InvisibilityisRacism, #IllumiNative, and #NativeTruth. How can students reclaim visibility while in college?
Diaz: Visibility is difficult to claim since it relies on the “sight” or “gaze” or vision of another in relationship to you. What I mean by this is that Indigenous invisibility is often not our problem, rather it is the problem of non-Natives and institutions. Native invisibility is a principal America was founded on — to erase us — so it is still present in the bloodlines and thoughtlines of American institutions, practices, etiquettes (such as words like civilized or intellectual or educated or mastery), etc.
That being said, we first and foremost have to make one another visible. ASU is a campus filled with amazing minds and hearts, including Indigenous professors and faculty and staff — we need to reach out, to begin to fill the spaces that are here, spaces that have always been Indigenous. I have found ASU a place where my own work and wonders can become more possible — and this is what I have to offer my Native students, those same avenues and paths to your futures, whether they involve returning home or leaving home. And we must support one another. Often, because we have become used to there being so few spaces for us, so few recognitions or awards, we tend to bump each other out of the way, competing for those few prizes. What if we instead linked arms and demanded we all arrive in those spaces together, as more, not as a homogenized group of Natives, but as autonomous individuals with nuanced imaginations and questions. We would then be visible, in numbers, in our own self recognition, and they would have to make more space for us, because we were making it for ourselves.
Indigenous scholars discuss the term “activism” and say Indigenous students attending institutions is a form of rhetorical sovereignty, meaning attending institutions that weren’t originally designed for us is a form of activism in itself. What are your thoughts on this?
Diaz: I grew up on a reservation. Reservations were not built to shape my future. They were built to ensure I had no future. That I would be erased. Here we are, how many hundreds of years later? We are thriving. We are dreaming. We are making love. We are teaching. We are traditional and modern. Every day I wake up, even when the morning is heavy-feeling, even when the day feels like it might be too big for me, I find a way to leap into it, to make it mine, to share it with others, to find ways to be kind to myself and to people around me. This is maybe one of the greatest acts of resistance, that I live, and I try hard to live the best that I can and to share that with my families and communities. Some days I think the greatest act of resistance isn’t necessarily to write a poem critiquing America but instead to love myself in the midst of America, and even sometimes despite America. Because even though I am more than America, because I come from what existed before it, I am also American. And to love yourself in this country is a revolutionary act.
One of the themes Turning Points Magazine strives to pass onto our readership is the importance of mentors and mentorship in academia. What is your advice to students on how they can seek mentors and maintain relationships with them?
Diaz: I was raised in a culture in which we didn’t ask questions — we were taught to listen. This made it hard for me to seek out mentorship when I was in grad school. I’m much more comfortable making a joke than asking someone for a help that might inconvenience them. I mean, when I was little, even when we were on trips, if someone offered us food, my mother had trained us to say, No thank you. Even if we were hungry. But since leaving home I’ve been lucky to meet so many generous mentors who noticed this in me and reached out first. I try to be that type of person with my students, the type of mentor who reaches out, who tells a story or a joke, to make it clear that I am interested in you and how your heart is doing today, that I am invested in the wonderful things you might build or make happen in this world. All this to say, yes, it’s great to reach out, but I also know that culturally, some of us have a different way of understanding this.
What tools and resources would you recommend that students utilize on expressing themselves through their selected majors?
Diaz: I’m going to advertise the classes I teach in creative writing, such as poetry, or fiction. We put a fancy word on it, and call it creative writing, but really, it is just storytelling. And we Natives know how to tell stories. Stories are the reason why we have survived. We have a humor like no other. Our imaginations are timeless — it’s hard for non-Natives to understand how we can be traditional and rooted to our pasts while also modern and living in and contributing to this contemporary world. We are the true America — what was and what can still be. One of the ways we can understand and question history and imagine our futures is through writing. So, look me up, find me and take a course with me, even if you aren’t majoring in English or creative writing. I teach with an Indigenous lens because it is one of the many lenses I live by. And my colleagues are also incredible teachers. Our creative writing program will only be made better by bringing Indigenous stories, the stories that are rooted in the very earth ASU is built on, to the community at large. I hope that we soon see more majors in creative writing and more Indigenous students in the MFA program.
Who are some Indigenous writers and artists you’d recommend students to check out?
Diaz: Shoot, the lists are endless. A few quick ones.
Poets: Michael Wasson, Jake Skeets, Layli Long Soldier, Bojan Louis, Henry Quintero, Tracey M Atsitty, Joan Kane, Orlando White, Sherwin Bitsui, Laura Tohe, Simon Ortiz, Heid Erdrich, Joy Harjo, Kimberly Blaeser, Sara Marie Ortiz, Laura Da’
Prose: Robin Wall Kimmerer, Louise Erdrich, Terese Mailhot, Tommy Orange, Rebecca Roanhorse, Cherie Dimaline, Debra Earling, Eden Robinson, Susan Power, Erika Wurth
Artists: Nicholas Galanin, Postcommodity, Nani Chacon, Cara Romero, Laura Ortman, Maria Hupfield, Christine Sandoval
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Taking Away the Children — Sarah Ruffing Robbins From “Eliza Harris” by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper With her step on the ice, and her arm on her child, The danger was fearful, the pathway was wild; But, aided by Heaven, she gained a free short, Where the friends of humanity open’d their door. From Laura Tohe’s “Introduction: Letter to General Pratt” “Your […] via Taking Away the Children — Sarah Ruffing Robbins
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For Further Reading
Denetdale, Jennifer Nez. “Chairmen, Presidents, and Princesses: The Navajo Nation, Gender, and the Politics of Tradition.” Wicazo Sa Review 21, No. 1 (2006): 9-28.
Hartman, Russell P. and David E. Doyel. “Preserving a Native People's Heritage: A History of the Navajo Tribal Museum.” Kiva 47, No. 4 (Summer, 1982): 239-255.
Lee, Lloyd L. “The Future of Navajo Nationalism” Wicazo Sa Review 22, No. 1 (Spring, 2007): 53-68.
Lee, Lloyd. “Navajo Cultural Identity: What Can the Navajo Nation Bring to the American Indian Identity Discussion Table?” Wicazo Sa Review 21, No. 2 (Autumn, 2006): 79-103.
Lee, Tiffany S. “’If They Want Navajo to Be Learned, Then They Should Require It in All Schools’: Navajo Teenagers' Experiences, Choices, and Demands regarding Navajo Language.” Wicazo Sa Review 22, No. 1 (2007), 7-33.
Morris, Charles. “Navajo Nation Council Reforms.” American Indian Law Review 16, No. 2 (1991): 613-617.
Schwarz, Maureen Trudelle. “The Story of the Holy Visit 1996: Prophecy, Revitalization, and Resistance in the Contemporary Navajo World.” Ethnohistory 45, No. 4 (Autumn, 1998): 747-793.
Stewart, Thomas, Philip May, and Anita Muneta. “A Navajo Health Consumer Survey.” Medical Care 18, No. 12 (1980), 1183-1195.
Towner, Ronald H. “The Navajo Depopulation of Dinétah.” Journal of Anthropological Research 64, No. 4 (2008): 511-527.
Webster, Anthony K. “’DON'T TALK ABOUT IT’: Navajo Poets and Their Ordeals of Language.” Journal of Anthropological Research 68, No. 3 (2012): 399-414.
Webster, Anthony K. “Imagining Navajo in the Boarding School: Laura Tohe's ‘No Parole Today’ and the Intimacy of Language Ideologies.” Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 20, No. 1 (June 2010): 39-62.
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Meghan Saul’s Interview with Rosemarie
The night I first met Rosemarie Dombrowski, she paired a black high-waisted pencil skirt with bold white dots and a white button-up with short sleeves and black polka dots the size a Sharpie would make. Her hair was pulled back; bright eyes behind dark rimmed glasses looked up energetically as she spoke about poetry to an audience of Community College faculty, family members, and creative award winners.
Rosemarie Dombrowski has a life centered around poetry: learning, teaching, and emotional exposing herself around the Valley and the world. (She studied West African dance as a graduate student at ASU - integrating studies of poetry and dance at the University of Ghana in ‘96.) Dombrowski also headed a poetry journal called Merge from 2005-2011, is the editor-and-chief of Rinky Dink Press (a poetry mini-zine,) and serves on the poetry board of Four Chambers. Outside of those credits, she is also a well-regarded writer, teacher, mother, partner, and, of course, an abundance of fun.
Poetic activities and events throughout the Valley have always been a passion for RD (as her students call her.) She was named Phoenix’ Poet Laureate in December 2016, and now enjoys said events as a dutiful contribution to her role with the city. As an emerging writer, I was ecstatic to find that RD was both approachable and willing to sit down with me.
We met on a Monday afternoon at the steel counter of Sip Coffee & Beer Garage (<hyperlink) where RD ordered a large black coffee, which she spruced at our table with goodies from her oversized purse.
She laughed genuinely as she obliged my request to pin a microphone to her strapless, cotton-maxi - calling our interview “so official,” even Cronkite like. I’m flattered that any of this seems remotely professional to her, as we’re seated at a high-top table with backless barstools. Immediately, RD blends casual conversation with authentic details. She speaks matter-of-factly about her life, work, and family in the two hours we are together and wears her metal-framed coral sunglasses the entire time.
I learn that while the country maintains a Poet Laureate (Juan Felipe Herrera) most states also select their own. (Arizona’s is Alberto Rios.) The Navajo Nation appointed Laura Tohe, a professor at ASU in September 2015 as their Poet Laureate, and a handful of major cities around the country have begun to do the same.
RD: Each week, I’m fielding somewhere in the neighborhood of five requests [or more] from teachers, educators, and otherwise.
Saul: To do what?
RD: Anything, really. I didn’t really think anyone would know that a poet laureateship had been created for the city of Phoenix. I mean how many people are listening to NPR at lunchtime?
Saul: A lot...
RD: (She smiles) I felt like maybe twenty people outside of the University would know. I felt it was a big deal, in my heart. I didn’t think that it was going to be a big deal, and then, when it really became a big deal, you know, behind the scenes, I was panicking. Lots of anxiety…
I was constantly feeling the pressure to live up to whatever people’s expectations were. I didn’t know what they were, but I figured they were high. People knew about the position, suddenly they knew who I was and all of these personal things were being written about me. I thought, Oh my God; what if I fail? Even if I just fail at one event, that’s failure - in the public eye. I don’t know if I could handle that. I was putting a lot of pressure on myself.
Saul: Are you used to being more in the public eye now?
RD: Yes, I am. I feel like I know… Well, I don’t know what people expect of me, but I know what I expect of myself. I know what my bar is for the Poet Laureateship and I know that I can meet, even exceed that.
In addition to a heavy rotation of speaking engagements and school visits, RD recently won a fellowship through the Lincoln Center through which she will create community gardens with lyrical art on the walls. Dombrowski has a number of other projects in mind for the city that she believes “will have long term impact.” Her passion is almost visible as she talks about visiting inner city schools and stimulating the minds of young people who have not been educated on various works she finds fundamental, as well as laws that might affect them.
---- SB1070 - u of a anthology - maya angelous --- Find/insert quote.
Saul: What about the people who say poetry is not for them - that they can’t understand it?
RD: The thing that intimidates people about poetry is that it’s written in verse form, with stanzas, that stop in the middle of the page instead of lines and sentences going to the end, as our eyes are sort of trained to read or process. If a poem were to look like a piece of prose, 90% of those people would approach [the same] text with almost no anxiety.
I try to expose people to very narrative poetry. Very contemporary. I read it and give them a copy to follow along, so they can see that there may be a reason for the line breaks, but also, it is just a story.
The thing I love about poetry; I call it the ubiquitous container.
It’s fact, it’s fiction, it is history, it is culture, it’s autobiography, biography, it is self and others. It has no rules. Fiction has very specific rules; so does nonfiction. When people say poetry has too many rules? It has no fucking rules; thematic or topical. People don’t understand the line breaks.
Saul: But there’s a cerebral aspect to it.
RD: Every word has to be purposeful. It’s about concision, so it’s about excision as well. Economy of words, which I love. I think almost everyone in this day and age is attracted to economy of words. Again, it’s the visual that they are not attracted to.
Saul: So, do you also consider yourself more cerebral than creative or more creative than cerebral?
RD: No. God, no. (laughing) I’m not more cerebral.
Saul: You use really big words...
RD: I’m definitely not more cerebral. I’m in the low end of cerebral-ity… No, I am. (She offers reassurance in response to my eye roll.)
Saul: Okay...
RD: I mean, for an academic, I shudder to even use the term… For an academic, I am not. I’m not top-notch, not even close. I don’t think that I was a terribly studious student. Things came naturally to me when I was young. I always cut corners – because I needed to spend more time on dance. I think it just came innately to me; I would cut the academic corners in order to have more time to do the creative stuff.
My priority has always been to have plenty of time for classes, rehearsal, choreography – which is still how I am. I’m a spin instructor. I spend a lot of time choreographing my schedule so that I can have time for my spin classes, for teaching spin classes, for writing and revising my manuscripts. Sometimes in the summer, I paint. I love repurposing antiques, so, I’m always trying to construct a schedule around that. ( check quote wording)
Saul: And are you actually chiseling out chunks? Like: I’m going to paint here, this is when I spin, today, I’m going to write…
RD: Spin is always on there. It is. But if I see a day, when there’s nothing, I’m definitely going to open the document entitled that month and write. Or I’m going to open up a manuscript that I’m working on; write and revise. If I see nothing on a day but online summer school, all of my documents are open. I also run Rinky Dink. (<insert hyperlink) That’s another thing that I do on my off days.
If I see a day that doesn’t have anything on it – what I’m going to do on those off days, is have a Post-it note or something and I’m going to be like: Rinky Dink, manuscripts, my manuscript, Vitacost (<insert hyperlink) shopping…You know, whatever.
Saul: Is spin how you keep your dancer self alive?
RD: (Nods while laughing) It is, to some extent. [Also,] poetry, because poetry is linguistic lyricality. You just sort of transfer it from the body into the mind and the mouth.
Saul: I love that.
RD: (continuing) Years ago, that happened for me. When I stopped dancing at the high level [after] college, all of that energy, all of that creative, lyrical, bodily energy went into the poetry. I think, if anything, I’m very visceral in my poetry. Visceral, bodily, autobiographical. I’m very sort of, self and self into society oriented, if that makes sense. The self has to begin the composition and then the self can move in space and enter into other conversational, social, or cultural spaces. Maybe I do move like a dancer in my poems somehow, because I don’t think the two have ever really been separate for me.
Rosemarie Dombrowski has two anthologies published. This year she released The Philosophy of Unclean Things (<insert hyperlink) with Finishing Line Press, in which her words delve readers into imagery related to fears, phobias, and other topics deemed unclean. The Book of Emergencies (<insert hyperlink) was published by Five Oaks Press and catalogs Dombrowski’s life as a single mother to her son on the Autism spectrum.
Other pieces of her work have appeared in numerous journals and publications yet despite a CV that spans sixteen packed pages, RD comes across modest yet confident, ambitious and excited about the works she’s accomplished and what the future may hold.
RD: The other thing I’ve been working on is called 17 Letters. They were epistolary poems, now they’re like flashes. Seventeen epistolary flashes written to my nonverbal seventeen-year-old son. They’re rough. They’re rough to get through. I’ve gone back into that highly confessional mode.
Saul: I was going to ask you about that because that’s sort of what Saul She Wrote is all about. [Confessionalism] is authenticity at its core. There’s so much strength in being able to own your story, to work through it, and bring what you bring to the page. Is there a double edge sword to that, do you think? Is it fully freeing for you or is it as self-deprecating as it is may be freeing?
RD: I’ve been writing in that mode for so long now. The Book of Emergencies was published in December of 2014, but, those poems span almost my son’s entire life.
Saul: So, these started really upon the emergence of motherhood and his diagnosis?
RD: Yes, and honestly, some of the earliest ones have not been revised. That’s just always been my natural mode - to be confessional and to tell a story in that way. They are narrative and confessional; it’s like a lyrical narrative if that makes sense. There’s always pieces of the narrative missing because I still privilege the lyrical composition over the narrative cohesion [which] also works for the world of autism because there is little that is cohesive or linear.
Saul: They are so raw and real. When you go back and read them do you still feel true to the words? Do you critique them or desire to make them different?
RD: I edited a lot of line breaks. I think only two poems underwent revisions. There’s not much that has changed for me there. I still read them and when I read them (not on the screen, because then I read them as a writer and start editing,) in the book themselves, I usually can't get through them without crying. That's how much of me, that’s how much of my life, my son’s culture, and the culture I feel like I am now a part of - voicing and giving agency to, is in those poems.
I don't think that there could ever be anything that I will do, as a writer, that is going to be more authentic or more important.
I feel like, they redeem, in some way, the flaws of my mothering. I mean this could be because I was raised Catholic, but they do feel like a confession to me. In some way, I feel very redeemed when i go back and read them. I feel absolved in some way.
It is like the literal act of confession that I was raised on. You were asking about self-deprecation; there is a self-flagellation process embedded in the process of writing them as well. It’s that admission of “sin” that is the first step in the process. That has to be there and it has to be authentic. I think, if it’s not painful, in some way, then it’s not really a confession.
Despite how improved my son’s behavior is, and despite how improved our relationship is, despite how much I want to tell that version of the story, there’s still so much ugly in the story, even [now] that unfolds on a daily basis.
There are many times I think, I can’t take another minute of this. There’s no reprieve, no one who understands how hard I work on these sixteen hour cycles to be who I am. To be his mother, and the provider, to keep up the house, buy all organic food, keep him on his supplements, and do all this cooking each night for his breakfast and lunch. There can be bitterness about that.
Saul: It’s a thankless job.
RD: Funny that you would say thankless because I did write a line in one of the letters that says something about him teaching me that love is neither a solvable nor reciprocal equation. He’s Autistic, you know.
Saul: It’s crazy that you are this literary academic and poet - don’t roll your eyes… Language is your art, it’s your dance, it’s your everything and then you are given this son who is nonverbal. What does that teach you or how does that change how you feel about communication?
RD: It’s ironic, I know, but it takes me back to those years of dance. All those years of nonverbal communication, you know, where you use the body to express, not just emotions, but ideas and stories. Everything that I know about dance, all that it has taught me of communication is what I rely on: the art of movement, of touch, contact with the floor, with other people, proximity, distance. I dance with my son a lot. We go to music shows a lot and dance together. He gets very upset if I tell him there’s not enough room for us to dance.
RD handed me her copy of (fill me out) at the start of our conversation. At a natural break in our conversation, I handed it back and asked her to read it aloud.
Saul: So good.
RD: I’m so glad you think so.
Though society continually shows appreciation for Rosemarie Dombrowski’s skillful composition, she maintains a humility that allows her to still appreciate my approval of how she’s approached our modern day Mad Lib. My favorite tidbits were when she spoke of “truth telling.” She writes that authenticity is “truth telling” with an asterisk to define the phrase as: “laying yourself bare/being vulnerable/telling your story in the hopes of eliciting compassion for yourself and others.”
RD: My big thing right now comes from Jane Hirshfield. It’s in an essay that comes from her collection Nine Gates. She’s one of my favorite poets and she argues in one of these essays that creativity is less about a unique sort of aesthetic style than it is about truth telling. Creativity is truth telling - is what her argument is… I think that’s part of the message that I am trying to convey to the kids [when I speak.] Even if you don’t think you’re creative, if you tell your truth, your story (which is just like your fingerprint, no two are alike,) then you are creative. That is uniqueness right there.
As she continued talking, I kept an eye on the clock, not wanting to be the reason she was late to pick up her son while secretly also wishing we could continue talking all day. Two hours was hardly enough time to absorb the powerful ways that Rosemarie Dombrowski’s story, passions, and struggles shape the way she navigates her life while simultaneously inspiring those around her.
Hours and weeks after our interview, RD is still teaching me through the many names, and readings she mentioned; links and resources for which are listed below.
Links to cool persons / things:
Roxane Gay:
Pank Magazine:
Anne Sexton:
Abortion Poem:
Poetry of Resistance, Voices for Social Justice:
Rinky Dink Press:
Jane Hirschfield:
Nine Gates:
Alberto Rios:
Laura Tohe:
Haymarket Squares:
_____ = poet who made first mini-zine
Vitacost.com:
Vocabulary Words:
Epistolary
Visceral
Flagellation
Anthology
Ubiquitous
Gregarious
https://www.facebook.com/saulshewrote/?pnref=lhc
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