The Wounded Hip By Michael Mulvihill

Deep within the territory,

The hawk and eagle screech,

In the deepest woods,

Where we roam, our bones bleeding,

Our hips failing with each step.

I tell the group,

"Live on the adrenaline of the fastest music

Our ancestors made,"

But not before

The hawk and eagle screech.

We try to move as if a jig

Is coursing through our bodies,

One last dance for the freshly crippled,

But truly, we cannot move an inch.

I tell the men to be quiet,

Let the eagle and hawk rest upon our shoulders.

"Yes, son, silence now.

Have a bit of rest,

Before the bear and wolf—

Who smell our blood upon the thicket—arrive."

"Yes," says the youngest, no more than fifteen,

"Those birds are voices,

Telling us our mothers are bringing us home,

To where we will finally find peace.

A place where we are not weaving a basket

For a kingdom we do not share.

We will go to the sweat lodge,

Purify our bodies,

Cleanse our minds.

The medicine man will return to the other world,

And find the parts of our souls lost to war."

"No," I tell him.

"As our wounds dig deeper and we lie upon the ground,

The birds are not telling us of a return.

They are telling us the war is over.

It is all over."