First Light by Linda Hogan

In early morning I forget I’m in this world with crooked chiefs who make federal deals. In the first light I remember who rewards me for living, not bosses but singing birds and blue sky. I know I can bathe and stretch, make jewelry and love the witch and wise woman living inside, needing to be silenced and put at rest for work’s long day. In the first light I offer cornmeal and tobacco. I say hello to those who came before me, and to birds under the eaves, and budding plants. I know the old ones are here. And every morning I remember the song about how buffalo left through a hole in the sky and how the grandmothers look out from those holes watching over us from there and from there. For Robin From “Savings” by Linda Hogan (Coffee House Press: $7.95, paper; 80 pp.). Hogan, a member of the Chickasaw Nation, received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation for her most recent book, “Seeing Through the Sun.” She has published poetry, fiction and essays in numerous magazines and anthologies. Hogan is an associate professor at the University of Minnesota and is active in the Birds of Prey Rehabilitation Foundation in Lakewood, Colo. 1988, Linda Hogan. Reprinted by permission of publisher.