I was frustrated by the lyrics posted elsewhere--I wanted them all on one page--anyway, they were inaccurate/misspelled/whatevs. Even one of the “official” on-screen words seems to be wrong. So, I took lyric transcription way too seriously: The Kittyman Sea Shanty 

I made it to the Plains and Mountains! The opening essay for this part by Heid E. Erdrich was filled with good information and helped set me up well for the poems I’ve read (so far) in this section. First, there is the advice that these poems are often both political and historical, but as an act themselves--not just as categories or subjects. But speaking of history, TIL that Abraham Lincoln ordered the execution of 38 Dakota warriors the same week that he signed the Emancipation Proclamation! 

I think I’ll mostly share lines that hit me as I read:

From D’arcy McNickle’s “Man Hesitates but Life Urges”:

When the sun, walking to his setting / Turns back for a last look

[...]

Down the valleys and over the hills, / Pointing with wavering finger; / Ever reaching to touch, trembling / Ever fearful to touch (106).

I think that last bit hit because there is a section in this region’s intro that introduces a poem I haven’t gotten to where a speaker refers to being close to the ground--to their power. So I was surprised (I guess) to see a speaker afraid to touch. But perhaps it’s the power that creates that fear.

From Elizabeth Cook-Lynn’s “At Dawn, Sitting at My Father’s House”:

The birds are commenting on his / passing (107) [his: a coyote who is walking by]

N. Scott Momaday’s “The Gourd Dancer, Mammedaty, 1880-1932″:

And all of this was for Mammedaty, in his honor, / as even now it is in the telling, and will be, as long as / there are those who imagine him in his name (111).

From Lois Red Elk’s “Our Blood Remembers”:

Our ancestral blood remembers the day / Sitting Bull, the chief of chiefs, was murdered.

[...]

when leaves and animals reached to touch him as he passed by (113).

From James Welch’s “Riding the Earthboy 40”:

Earthboy farmed this land / and farmed the sky with words (116).

And then in Richard Littlebear’s “We are the Spirits of these Bones,” which is written in both Cheyenne and English, the poem is very much about place and wolf songs, and I began to notice the repetition of “hetseohe” in the Cheyenne on some lines about place--but not all--and it made it clear how the signifiers of words both slip and are on a spectrum that includes meaningless or inadequate and also bursting with meaning.

From Lance Henson’s “Anniversary Poem for Cheyennes who Died at Sand Creek”:

Today, I finished up the “Northeast and Midwest” section of the book. It’s becoming clear that a number of the contemporary poets attended or taught-teach at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe. If nothing else, seems like a good potential source for future reading.

One favorite from today was Ray Young Bear’s “Our Bird Aegis.” There’s so much happening in the five-stanza poem, and I’m intrigued by the “our” in the title and similar language in the poem. Who is in addition to the speaker? And later, how does “my younger brother” fit with that? Anyway, it’s a damn good poem. All of Young Bear’s were. I also appreciated Marcie Rendon’s take on the frustrations of being Indian in this country, and I requested her first “Cash Blackbear” mystery from the library. That’s something to look forward to, I think.

This last half of the section was filled with a lot of great work, including “Sweetgrass Is Around Her” by Sallie M. Kawennotakie Benedict, who tells of the speaker’s mother’s aunt. It’s a beautiful, full picture of a woman with only minimal detail. Truly beautiful.  Kimberly M. Blaeser has three pieces in the collection, each very different. Two of them were favorites within the whole section, and I was glad to read that she has four collections of her own and also edits a journal of contemporary Ojibwe poetry. “And we turn this sound / over and over again / until it becomes / fertile ground / from which we will build / new nations / upon the ashes of our ancestors” (70). And this important reminder: “ink makes strong cultural bias. This is how we remain captured in print” (71).

I dug into another chunk of Northeast and Midwest poetry, reading from about 40 to 50. I made myself a promise to only read when I was eager and when I’m not distracted. Apparently, I’m easily distracted today. That’s okay.

In fact, the first piece I read spoke to this, at least in this reader’s mind. In “Shrinking Away” by Jim Northrup, the “story” of the poem is powerful, and of course, so are the words. In some ways, I want to learn other stories as I read, but on the other hand, I will take some lines into my life, and from this one: “surviving the peace was up to me.” And it is up to me. Really, surviving is up to me. I have the vested interest.

On the one hand, looking for themes in literature feels a little unsophisticated. But as a non-member of a Native Nation, it’s hard not to--also, the intro did tell me about some to look for, and I’ve found that the sophisticated reading I learned to do isn’t as enjoyable or as productive as I might like, and I do love to see shared themes, in part because repetition DOES suggest things we should pay attention. So, when I read in Gail Tremblay’s “Indian Singing in 20th Century America,” that “even the stones sing / although their songs are infinitely / slower than the ones we learn / from trees” (43), well it brings back the land that the trees with their messages, and now we’re told or reminded that the stones can sing and communicate, too. And we already know of the familial relation of the pine tree from Vizenor... but I love that we learn individual perspectives on, say trees, and yes, these perspectives are individual. One voice does not speak as all Native Nations voices. And yet, there is a sense that the voices SHOULD be collective, and here we are taking them all in, and it’s a gift. And I am loving the experience of each individual poet, and also giving my hearing and reading of the voices into a collective voice that speak together, too. It’s lovely to be a witness to culture through individual voices. As Tremblay writes “each breath alters the composition / of the air” (43). And reading that poem--the line means even more in strengthening the voice. It’s empowering, even outside the culture.

The second “book club” (see earlier post about the Native Nations anthology) I wanted to start that didn’t drum up too much commitment or excitement (HA!) is A Philosophy of Software Design by John Ousterhout. And I get it. But heck, a book club is how I thought I would need to be motivated!

But I got going. I skipped the Preface, because fuck prefaces. I scanned it to know it was how this book came about and how to contact the author. Duly noted.

Chapter 1 doubles as the Introduction, which is nice. I usually read the introductions to books, especially technical ones, but sometimes it’s daunting to realize you haven’t even REALLY started the book. This chapter/intro was also short. I think that’s a good way to start a tech book.

Like my other self-book-club, I decided to go with “read until it feels like focus will be lost if one goes further.” So, I read through chapter 2. There’s not a lot of mind-blowing stuff, but I’ll try to capture some highlights.

“The greatest limitation in writing software is our ability to understand the systems we are creating” (Ousterhout 1). This explains why the intro and the first couple chapters are explicitly about complexity.

One thing that really stood out to me is how similar ideas are in both the Native Nations poetry anthology I was reading earlier and this book, which someone might think just isn’t so, but since I went to grad school for English and am now I software engineer, I can tell you they ain’t so different. Anyway, Ousterhout writes, “it becomes harder and harder for programmers to keep all of the relevant factors in their minds as they modify the system” (1). Well! In grad school and the anthology I was reading earlier makes clear: That’s why we have writing. If our memories could hold all_the_things, we’d hold them. But instead, we write. Our brain loses a bit of muscle by doing that (see Plato or Socrates), but it’s just necessary. There’s a lot of info out there. There’s a lot going on in our codebase. That said, Ousterhout does not necessarily go to writing as how we’ve dealt with complexity and how it relates to writing. At least not so far. But I have noted it as an interest of mine.

Ousterhout focuses on how “reducing complexity is the most important element of software design” (3), and I expect that’s true, but writing best come into play more, too. And not just good variable names, though those help.

The intro/chapter one indicates we’ll be learning some “red flags” to watch for, and that’s helpful. Code smells, I’m guessing. But anyway, it’s nice to know what’s ahead. And Chapter 2 does begin to get into complexity and helpfully lays out three key ways complexity is an issue--or the symptoms of it: Change amplification, cognitive load, and the unknown unknowns. I can get behind those as symptoms.

Moreover, it identifies that “complexity is caused by two things: dependencies and obscurity” (9). Ousterhout emphasizes the need to reduce dependencies and also to make them as simple and as obvious as possible. I can support that.

He does list the need for “excessive documentation” to be a red flag that something is too complex, and while I appreciate documentation, he may be right that even extensive documentation might be an indicator that things could be designed a bit more clearly. I do appreciate that he emphasizes that it’s easier to spot complexity in others’ work than in our own, which means both that we should expect to write complexity into our code, and it’s not that we’re bad coders because of that. We can become better as we notice it in others’ work, though. Hopefully avoiding it in our own.

I’ve decided, I guess, to use my Tumblr as a virtual book club. Which is to say, there were two books I thought I might prefer to read as in a book club for accountability, but I didn’t have any takers in the places I mentioned it, so fuck it. I’ll just post thoughts I might’ve shared in such a book group here. The first book is When the Light of the World was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through - Ed. Joy Harjo. I have long loved Harjo’s poetry and speaking, and I have also loved much of the Native Nations literature I’ve encountered over the years, so I was glad to order and pick this up from Annie Bloom’s Books here in Portland.

As an aside, the longer I’ve looked at this book, waiting to be read, the more the kerning before that comma has really upset me. I may have to “fix” my copy with paint or something. But I digress...

My plan with this kinda one-person book club: Start from the intro and read as much as makes sense. Mostly, read until I’m not really engaged with what I’m reading. For this part, I read the Introduction through to end of a poem on page 40, which is in the “Northeast and Midwest” part of the book, which is divided into five parts based on land. “We begin with the land” (Harjo 1).

Reading the intro, I’m brought back, somewhat, to grad school. Mostly as a reflection of how much more I know about how I learn, take in, and appreciate literature. And how going to grad school almost ruined that for me. That said, if I could go back, I’d start by working with...someone or some entity, saying, “This is how I learn and how I’ll be able to share with you what I’ve learned, but I will not be able to succeed if you insist on measuring my knowledge in this standardized way.” And maybe, we’d all decide I should just get a master’s and move along. Maybe we’d have all been smart enough to see that answer or to decide that there might be another way to know how the knowledge and I were working together. Harjo highlights “nor did we store our memory in books and on papers,” and I recall the grad seminar discussion where I came to know that the purpose of writing was a replacement for memory. We have Plato and Socrates, for example, with memories to beat the band, because that is what there was--much like so much of Native literature. It is oral and performance and songs, and the legacy of storytelling between generations, and writing is only here for memory. Or like for me, to process my thoughts. But again, if I could remember each thought in order while thinking new thoughts, perhaps I could just process them in my brain--and retain the lessons I came to know. But I do not, and so I find writing best for processing thoughts.

The intro points out how many Native Nations writers identify the irony of writing in English. Sure, it became and is a shared language enabling trade, what with so many Native languages, but as the language of those that stole so much and would eliminate such a culture, at least early on, there is definitely irony. Harjo also writes “It is the nature of the divided world in which we live” (3), which strikes me as a defining point in things I appreciate. Grad school helped me appreciate critical thinking and holding contrary opinions together. When I finally decided to convert to Judaism, it was in part because of the teaching that learning (Torah or about life as a Jew) is a journey, and Judaism is about arriving at the journey--not arriving at a decision or an interpretation or an end. But arriving at a journey.

A number of themes and ideas are outlined in the intro, which will serve as good reminders when taking in the work within: land, in particular. But also the relationship to the receiver or participant in the poetry. The trickster, of course. The ancestors, of course.

In the intro the “Northeast and Midwest” part, Kimberley M. Blaeser reminds us especially of the early writers--and even more especially the early women writers, there is a clear translation at hand, as they try to convey cultural experience “into the English poetic forms and vernacular of the time” (13), and that’s so helpful to think about when reading the early works. In some cases, the translation is so full that one wonders if finding such things outside the context of a Native writer’s writing would allow one to identify it as such. I strived to find such indicators, but I acknowledge that...I could just be another white person trying to see whatever I consider “authentic Native” themes or wording. I could be full of shit. Well, surely I am. But I suppose if we acknowledge that context, it’s okay if I give it a go, as long as I don’t assume I’m right. Heck, Blaeser names a number of poets who “embody effects of manifest destiny, assimilation policies, and stereotypic misrepresentations” (14), so I’m not alone in looking for these things--and finding them even if they’re not there--I expect.

What I especially like in the early poetry in this “Northeast and Midwest” sections is the attempt at providing a full understanding: The various translations from long ago are presented with the literal translations we now have, and sometimes the authors’ own translations. And all that changes among them is really quite revealing.

This is already quite long, particularly with all the intro to my project, the book’s project, and the “Northeast and Midwest” part, so I won’t get into my marginalia with each of the works. At least not in this post. I will say that in this initial reading, “The Old Man’s Lazy” by Peter Blue Cloud (Aroniawenrate), a Mohawk, was my favorite. In part, because it’s more modern than the initial work in this section, and I prefer contemporary writing. But also, Blue Cloud’s use of indent! It’s powerful, I tell you. I also found a section that related to an event I just read about today--or that I could apply and see relevant themes.

In the poem, the speaker clearly has contradictory desires regarding being understood, and that itself--the contradiction--holds the poem together. I am trying to keep the largest theme, land, in mind as I read the pieces, and indeed, there is a theme of urban vs. rural and boundaries throughout. Also, how perspective weaves the story we tell--and that diversified view is captured in the poem. Oh, it’s just wonderful! “Each day / a different story is / told me by the fence [...] I tell my grandchildren / many of these stories, / perhaps / this too is one of them” (36). And I do love a good story about storytelling.