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Big Chief Dave
My brother's a big time shaman
he could do dances of power.
Ya Hey! long before he could write a 5 paragraph essay
or unravel the mysteries of long division,
I tell you he was shaping the physical world
with his mind
and the hands and feet
of his child body.
My brother Dave could pull fish from the sea
My brother Dave he could call butterflies from the sky and
bring heavy snow on Sunday nights to extend the
weekend.
My brother Dave always knew what the cat was thinking or
where your keys were or what adult was drunk enough
to let you finish his beer.
But mostly Big Dave danced in bowling alleys.
Oh, He'd let that ball go sliding down that shiny floor.
He never worried, not about where that ball would go, he
knew it was taken care of.
His feet would hop, up down, first left then right. His back
muscles would pull misshaping my brother into some
crazy human gargoyle. Look! his shoulders are tight,
that ball is gonna move, I tell you. Watch his elbows
draw up taunt like bows...fingers, some curled some out
at angles. Oh that ball its gonna dance and weave now...
"Hey" I wanna yell, "he's cheating" but no one sees the
strings he strums, the spirit strings he pulls to move the
ball, or slashes out with to whip the pins to go crashing
down, he uses the same strings he catches all those
flounders with. Oh that’s the same string he uses to lasso
snow flakes from the sky.
Watch him! Watch my brother dance.
Look it! Look at those who dance with him
You see them dressed as bears, wolves, and ghosts.
Ya Hey! look at him dance.
Friggin' weird enit?
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