Nálí, Her Solo
next to her bed her instrument sleeps
covered for the night like a bird in a cage
night passes . . . . . . the light returns
she pulls the cover away
dust motes dance in the air
she tunes her loom
strums the white parallel lines
with a flick of her wrist
each string must vibrate
layers of notes grow upward
tamp tamp tamp tamp
she listens for the right pitch
inserts the percussion fork into
the parallel lines that lead upward
she pulls down mountains, stars, lightning, storm patterns
tamp tamp tamp tamp
she is mythic soloist, storyteller, mathematician
her concert transforms us
we soften like lambskin
Copyright © 2022 by Laura Tohe. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on November 24, 2022, by the Academy of American Poets.
“I had been trying to write this poem for over a year, and then the listening aspect of the poem emerged. My grandmother was not only a weaver, but a musician. The preliminary steps she took were like a musician warming up her stringed instrument. The tamp tamp sounds of the weaving fork, as she moved it across the weft, brought back strong, aural-rhythmic memories. I could not remember when it didn’t soothe me, as I knew she was creating something beautiful, layer by layer, like notes rising, like she was doing a solo.”
—Laura Tohe
Laura Tohe
Laura Tohe is Sleepy-Rock People clan and born for the Bitter Water People clan. A poet and librettist, she is the author of Tseyí / Deep in the Rock (University of Arizona Press, 2005), which received the Arizona Book Association’s Glyph Award for Best Poetry and Best Book. She is Professor Emerita with Distinction at Arizona State University and the current poet laureate of the Navajo Nation.