The poem Weaving with My Grandmothers is rooted in the years I have spent taking classes to learn to weave. I am not an artful weaver, but I am a committed student of both the Yakama wapaas baskets and the Coast Salish cedar and wool weaving. This poem relates some of a conversation that I had with a Coast Salish wool weaving teacher, after he observed my skill. This becomes in the poem a dialogue about our connection conscious and unconscious to our ancestors. It is an awareness that after all my personal journey, all the U.S. societal interference in our cultural integrity as Coast Salish and other tribal, that even after all that I can catch myself doing something like weaving that would be familiar to my many generations back grandmothers. This poem when read has a rhythm to it that audiences enjoy.This is a fun poem to read.
