James Thomas Stevens is the author of six books of poetry, Tokinish (1994), Combing the Snakes from His Hair (2002), (dis)Orient (2005), Mohawk/Samoa: Transmigrations (2006), The Mutual Life (2006), and A Bridge Dead in the Water (2007). He is a member of the Akwesasne Mohawk tribe, attended the Institute of American Indian Arts and The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa and holds an MFA from Brown University.
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Combing the Snakes from His HairPoemsFrom"A Half-breed’s Guide to the Use of Native Plants (Cirsium discolor / Pasture Thistle)"
Bristling outward
his sadism roots him deepest.
Some will hurt whomever they choose.
God-headed and radiant
but shimmering little to offer.
Don’t build your bed of crisis
or lie on the down of his ire.
Combing the Snakes from His Hair:Poems -
Combing the Snakes from His HairPoemsFrom"Volley"
Aware that sudden fires,
like clouds come often at night,
I move to undo your thigh
and absent years dwindle
like cinders above the water.
But small birds
slip from branches at the salvo,
waiting for the sky to fall.
Combing the Snakes from His Hair:Poems -
Combing the Snakes from His HairPoemsFrom"The Ritual of Condolence"
v. THE BLOODY HUSK-MAT BED
As a boy I created wounded men in fields behind the house,
dragging them to safety beneath the sumac mounds.
I made mud to set broken limbs and held bleeding hands.
And when I grew older, I found a mourning dove
fallen from its nest too early. Careful not to move it,
I forced worm’s meat inside its beak.
In the night I heard danger and walked barefoot to the yard,searching sightless till I felt my own sick weight
displace that feathered vault of heaven.
And I fell to the grass – a doctor undone
sitting cross-legged in wretchedness.
Combing the Snakes from His Hair:Poems
“A writer of Native American descent, his vision extends geographically from the United States to Asia to the Middle East and chronologically from the present back five hundred years to what some deem the age of discovery and others call an invasion. In articulating this vision, Stevens probes the borders of language and memory—as what’s shared not only between individuals but also between cultures. As a result, much of his poetry consists of fragmented narratives in which contact is a form of disruption—the intrusion of an outside as history and as other.” —Alan Gilbert, The Believer [on A Bridge Dead in the Water]
“This book is a fresh and calculated examination of the ‘native’ poet's dilemma—where does the poet turn when the ‘native’ tongue is vanquished and the ‘adopted’ will not suffice?” —Kevin Thomas Patrick di Camillo, Notre Dame Review [on Tokinish]
Selected Works
