Nia Francisco
riding by a bar called "nn"
where broken wine bottles trickle
down sun-baked face of earth
where barb-wire-type scar crawls
over a navaho swollen nose
trickling tears down swollen lips
over chapped cheeks at home alone
as casted silver buttons/visions
fade into stoned grave flower images
where a mirage of yei bii che
quivers in brown red eyes of mine
sadness, emptiness in a voice
as a beggar behind a woven blanket
in a photograph
of navaho times
the weakness of a spring sprout
shows in drunken men and women
only to have eyes glisten with greed for turquoise/silver
eyes belonging to gallup independent
readers riding by a bar called "navaho inn."
nia francisco. "navaho inn" from Sun Tracks, vol. 2, no. 1 (fall 1975). Copyright ©1975 by nia francisco. Reprinted by permission of the author.
As printed in Larry Evers, ed. The South Corner of Time. Tucson, Ariz.: The University of Arizona Press, ©1980, p. 96.