All These Words

Yesterday is working toward memory but I can still taste it, feel the eagle feather presented to me by Polly and by the Makah tribe, hear the great inner silence that comes internally before any great passing comes up to our feet.
This entry will not be enough so I will write it again, and again until I can set it down, make tea, and step over the distracting smell of clothes that are too clean and begin to carve out a book that kicks fiercely within me. Today I have spent at the Clallam Bay High School talking to one class after another, until I am in the gym telling stories to row after row of new faces and the reach of questions. I am hearing this new voice come out of me for the first time. Today is the first day after the walk. I am talking about bears, showing strings of ivories and playing the same worn cedar flute but this voice, this voice is new. I don't know this me. I don't know this voice, this man. He is braver than I am. He is stronger. He is already trying on new boots and countries between words he speaks, and I wonder about our future, our next road.