Written by editor on 11 December 2017
BY THOMAS R. SMITH
Some people came out to greet us, others held
back, facades preserving a solemn
silence, whether of privacy, vacancy
or sorrow. Yet smiles escaped our little
roving chorus, whether for our stumbles
over the carols”' verses in Spanish, or
for having lit a few faces in windows
and doorways of South Minneapolis.
Lifting my gaze from twilight pavement
and shadowed porches. I”'m not sure when
it happened. I suddenly saw them,
crows, hundreds, maybe thousands in the burnt-
orange dusk, surrounding us in all
directions, clustered crows enough to re-leaf
the bare trees, great black choir-lofts of crows,
their dark notes strung on staves of the sky.
Overhead, too, crows everywhere, flapping
through the lurid, smudged air like ash from some
vast burning which perhaps was after all
simply the crows¹ Christmas, their excitable
cawing and clacking a kind of caroling
above our earthbound song, urging us out
from our less visible darkness to recognize
also those angels of the nearer heavens.
Thomas R. Smith is a poet, essayist, editor, and teacher living in River Falls, Wisconsin. He teaches poetry at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis. His new and selected prose poems, Windy Day at Kabekona, will be out from White Pine Press in 2018.… Read the rest “CAROLING WITH CROWS Phillips Neighborhood, Christmas 2016”
Written by editor on 11 December 2017
By Laura Waterman Wittstock
A tribute to a life well-lived should not start with a quarrel with the New York Times, but this instance is an exception. On October 30th the New York Times called the Ojibwe patriot a militant as he had been labeled so many times before during his lifetime. The newspaper, in its apparent omniscient wisdom said he “achieved few real improvements in the daily lives of Native Americans, who live on reservations and in major cities and lag behind most fellow citizens in jobs, housing and education.” The article went on to describe the 1973 police encounter in Custer, SD. Later demonstrations in 1999 led by Tom Poor Bear in nearby White Clay, NE led to discontinuation of alcohol sales, having a major effect on the nearby Pine Ridge Reservation. The area had the highest per capita alcohol sales in the US.
To be sure, “D.J.” as he was known to many, exhibited real anger and frustration at the conditions Indian people were forced to endure, both historically and in contemporary times. The patriots of the American Revolution are celebrated today, even though they broke through the boundaries of other sovereign people, burned food supplies, killed women and children in order to starve out the military capabilities and prevent a presumed reinforcement of King George”'s military.… Read the rest “Nowa Cumig: Dennis Banks 1937-2017”
Written by editor on 11 December 2017
By Harvey Winje
In Native American folklore, the intelligence of crows is usually portrayed as the most important characteristic of crows. Seeing a crow was and is still considered good luck by many Native American tribes.
“As the crow flies” refers to the shortest distance between two points because the common belief is that crows fly a straight course. Actually, crows are excellent flyers that do not usually fly in a straight line but zigzag and perform aerial acrobatics seemingly for the joy of it. Crows can often be seen circling above their nests on a winter”'s afternoon. Scientists say crows, like humans, pay close attention to people”'s faces and are able to remember threatening or caring faces and react to them differently.
Words and phrases may be misused, be inaccurate or concepts can be oversimplified. The same thing can occur when using a single story to describe a person, culture, or community. Phillips Community and its people are often labeled and defined by a single occurrence or story, observed or reported by people outside of the community. The Alley Newspaper instead tries to lift up the many, many stories and illuminate the history of the people of this geographic area with the goal of inspiring resilience.… Read the rest ““As the Crow Flies” and the Phillips Community”
By Laura Waterman Wittstock
