When We Were Savages – III (A collaborative poem by five Jeff City Poets)

III. Minik Wallace
(c. 1890 – Oct. 29, 1918)

By Bob Boldt

I lie here, one in a sea
of cots and coughing bodies,
heaving our last.

I lie, Minik, the first and last,

Inuit son of a mighty hunter.

Icebergs float past my bed

in this municipal gymnasium,
now a field hospital.
Sometimes the icebergs
become starched nurses
making rounds,
followed by pallbearers.
All around, the smell of antiseptic
and the breath of death
no delirium can staunch.

Yesterday, I smelled fresh seal blubber
hung in the cold air to dry.
Why did I come back here if not to die
in the bad air of this new world?
Now I will ride the smoke to see
this Jesus or my mighty hunter father,
whichever can get to me first across
the icy wastes of Paradise.
I still remember
when Robert Peary took us off
to where the giant icicles
pierce the grey sky.
Manhattan they called it
and they called me Wallace,
Minik Wallace.

Why did they carry me to this cursed land
of fouled air and fish in cans?
This land I cannot understand
and cannot leave;
this land of the psychopaths.
In my childhood,
I only met one of these kunlangetese.
On my island these issues were resolved:
thirteen went hunting that day,
twelve returned.
I thank Mr. Peary and the Museum for my education,
and I understand perjury.
I would give all the Bibles in the world
for a good kayak and a whalebone harpoon.
_______________
[Editor’s Note: Wikipedia article on Minik Wallace.]

Copyright © 2021 by Bob Boldt A filmmaker, writer, artist, and retired commercial film producer with an abiding sense of the inherent dissonance between appearance and reality, Bob Boldt pursues community organizing, poetry, publication, and still & video production in Jefferson City, Missouri. He joined the staff as a contributing editor toward the end of 2014, and continued as a columnist in January 2017. A gallery of his visual work can be viewed at ello.co/deboldt. [Portrait painted by Jane B. Mudd]