Family Tree or Comanches and Cars Don’t Mix

Spanish captive, Hoahwah, married twin sisters. The one wife called Double turned into a snake after eating a nest of glossy eggs. Snake Woman still lives on Mt. Scott, sleeps facing west. The sun a white skull itself bathes her on the cedar breaks. In rectangular dreams she calls the young men grandson. The other sister Tsi-yee, named after a war deed (her father charged a cavalry office knocked him off his horse then lanced him to the prairie) bore three children: Tabe titah, Namnetse, and Sam Hoahwah. Lena, Sam Hoahwah’s favorite daughter ran off with an Arapaho from Canton. Sam sent his men after her on horseback, their ranch-hand-shadows overcast the Cheyenne and Arapaho Rez. Lena said: I ain’t comin back. She bled to death on a mattress after a miscarriage. Mother couldn’t remember Lena just the car ride to Post Oak Cemetery and watching wind in the pinwheels. Mother died the same age, fish-tailing into Comanche history in a Chevy Z-28 without car insurance. Great grandfather Sam Hoahwah first Indian in southwest Oklahoma to own a car got run over with his own Model-T. His Mexican cowboy-chauffeur forgot to take it out of gear when Sam crank-started the car. Not far from his own car, Uncle Fredrick was found dead in the weeds of Cache Road, keys missing. He sang gospels in Comanche, and backup on Robby Robertson’s Contact from the Underworld of RedBoy. (Uncle liked Levon Helm better.) Frederick Jr. caught ghost sickness bicycling across Post Oak Cemetery at night. He looked past his shoulder it twisted his face. The moon mocks him now. After the incident, his girlfriend fell in love with his cousin Rusty nicknamed Rabbit who loves fried baloney and calls it Indian Steak. Rabbit’s younger brother paints abstract horse murals in empty swimming pools, and images of a 20 foot long red talking snake who calls him grandson in his dreams.