Notre Freres

Marilyn Dumont

We were born beneath the water
in the darkest depths of the lake
We rise, our hooves rumbling
spewing lake water, muzzles dripping

in the darkest depths of the lake
Will Gabriel call, us, his brothers
spewing lake water, muzzles dripping
pulling the universe in our sway

Will Gabriel call, us, his brothers
riding his swiftest buffalo runner
aiming Le Petit
pulling the universe in their sway
the Milky Way – dust of buffalo spirits passing

Riding his swiftest buffalo runner
Will Gabriel, aiming Le Petit
rise, his horse’s hooves rumbling?
dust of buffalo spirits passing

We were born beneath the water

“They were born beneath the water, in the darkest depths of the lake” ( Freedman 8)
Buffalo Hunt by Russell Freedman
New York: Holiday House, 1988

Previously published in The Pemmican Eaters, ECW Press, 2015.

Marilyn Dumont‘s A Really Good Brown Girl won the 1997 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. This collection is now a Brick Books Classic and in French translation from Les editions Hannenorak Press. Her second collection, green girl dreams Mountains, won the 2001 Stephan G. Stephansson Award from the Writer’s Guild of Alberta. Her third collection, that tongued belonging, won the 2007 McNally Robinson Aboriginal Poetry and Aboriginal Book of the Year. The Pemmican Eaters was published by ECW Press, 2015. Marilyn has been the Writer-in-Residence at the Edmonton Public Library, the Universities of Alberta, Brandon, Grant MacEwan, Toronto-Massey College, and Windsor. She has been faculty at the Banff Centre – Writing with Style and Wired Writing and advised and mentored in the Aboriginal Emerging Writers’ Program.