Rally at the Capital

^{Bismarck, ND}

Camp bursts from busses, vans, opens like an agate 
               on the state-sponsored lawn. Uniform 
and over-mowed blades obscured now by the flash 

of jingle dresses, jewel-toned I Stand with Standing Rock 
               tees. Water is Life signs float like sails, 
let us believe our collective bodies could be 

a boat. Ricardo shares a sketch, a small girl 
               placing a flower in the gaping throat 
of a gun; the ends of Red Fawn’s ribbon skirt 

flutter like the cobalt butterflies back at camp; 
               and everyone chants Protect the Sacred, Protect 
the Sacred. We round dance, rise and fall like one 

set of lungs. Our skyward fists are a release 
               of balloons. And none of this requires 
the rows of National Guard men swaddled

in riot gear, matched and ill-fitting pants. 
               I lay on the grass beside a huddle 
of quiet kids. RJ asks why there are so many 

cops, so many guns, when nobody has done 
               anything violent? Halle says, they want us 
to start getting afraid. The monolith

of men shadow us like the brutalist 
               building they line up before. 
The obligatory blankness in their faces 

blurring and disappearing the bowed 
               lips, birthmarks, moles, the small 
asymmetries their lovers must think of at night.