This poem by Sherman Alexie appeared in Hanging Loose 56 and was reprinted in
The Business of Fancydancing, his
first book.
DISTANCES
I’ve watched the Children of The Third World
starving on television. I’ve heard the
stand-up comic ask, “why didn’t the cameraman give that kid a fucking
sandwich?” I know all the mothers of America have told their kids: “Clean up
your plate. There are people starving in
India.” When I was young, living on the
reservation, eating potatoes every day of my life, my mother would tell me to
“clean up your plate or your sister will get it.”
*
A woman writes to a man who used to live here.
I write back, pretending I’m the man she’s been searching her whole life
for. “Do you still love me,” she writes
to ask him, and me.
*
I do not speak my native tongue. Except
that is, for the dirty words. I can tell
you what I think of you in two languages.
(excerpt)
We’ve published six books of
Sherman’s altogether. The newest, Face,
is Small Press Distribution’s best seller of the past ten years. Of course, he’s also published an amazing
number of story collections, novels and journalism, made movies, entertained
countless audiences, and won many awards.
I suppose that’s the reason for a question I began hearing a while back:
“I guess Sherman has changed a lot over the years, huh?” They don’t mean “I
guess Sherman doesn’t live on commodity cheese anymore.” They’re longing for me
to say, “Yeah, he’s become a monster of ego, impossible to please.” When I say
that’s absolutely not true, the disappointment is palpable.
The other question I hear a
lot, from smirking interviewers, is “Say, how did an Indian from out West ever
come to publish with a press in Brooklyn?”
I’m often tempted to say he was tied to a pony and led into the fort by
John Wayne, but I usually just point out that he was a college graduate and so
he knew how to put stamps on an envelope.
My favorite recent question
came when Sherman made his second appearance on The Colbert Report some weeks ago. Donna Brook and I accompanied
him both times. We were waiting for him to show up at the studio when one of the
producers walked by. “I remember you,” she said. You’re Sherman’s parents, aren’t
you?” Either we’re looking more Indian or Sherman’s looking more Brooklyn or
her eyes were closed.
-- Robert Hershon
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