Autumn Leaves volume 7 number 6

Crying for a Dream

by "I'm Bad Medicine"

This piece was written about a time in the late 1980s when the Windriver Reservation in Wyoming lost over two dozen young men to suicide over a period of a year and a half. I know of a few other reservations here on the northern plains that have experienced the same trauma since that time, only on a smaller scale.

Remember Windriver,
When the future ceased to be?
And the crying of The People filled the air?
And the sound of mothers' weeping was
Swallowed by the hills before it hit the
Reservation line?

Remember Windriver,
With no tomorrow to see?
When The People wandered wondering
How our hope could lay down?
The eagles wouldn't fly
For the songs on sacred smoke?

Remember Windriver,
When we couldn't find The Way?
And this world and the next
Were hand in hand?
Our promise became broken
And could not go on?

Remember Windriver,
How the world wouldn't turn?
And the left behind had no
Answer for each other?
Because the only answer was
The wind, and the sun, and the sky?

Remember Windriver?

Remember Windriver.

Copyright © 2003, "I'm Bad Medicine," all rights reserved.

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