Editor’s note: On Nov. 23, Temecula celebrated the inaugural Pechanga Pu’eska Mountain Day Holiday Commemoration. The event commemorates the victorious struggle of the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians, who stopped Granite Construction, a Northern California-based company seeking to encroach on sacred lands with a mine project called Liberty Quarry.
Pu’eska mountain sits on the city of Temecula’s southern border. It’s a mass of land that millions of people have driven past on their way through the Temecula Valley,an integral part of the tribe’s creation story and legacy called Pu’eska.
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From the Agua Tibia Wilderness south of Temecula. via wikicommons
By Will Falk
Dakwish
that old cannibal is back
I heard he was dead
but ever since
the Granite Construction Company
came around Temecula
wanting to drill holes in Pu’eska
I’ve had my doubts
the way I heard the old stories
Dakwish wanted to eat everyone
he liked fat old ladies and little boys best
but he’d eat anyone
kill them
then pound them up with a pestle
crunching up bones
so they’d be easy to swallow
one day he went too far
when he ate the chief’s son
the people came together
and killed Dakwish
but when they burned his body
he exploded and flew to the stars
I heard another story about
how many of the first people
our relatives became
birds and animals and trees
and stones
now the Granite Construction Company
wants to build a quarry here
where they’d smash rocks
then pound them up with machines
crunching up stones
so they’d be easy to swallow
that old cannibal is back
and he’s going too far
the people need to come together
and kill Dakwish again
make sure he can’t fly anywhere
Bio: I recently moved to San Diego from Milwaukee, WI where I was a public defender. I am looking for life outside of law. My first passion is poetry and I am interested in the way the land speaks through the poet. If you can’t find me drinking too much coffee in Cafe Calabria, I’ll be on a rock somewhere in Joshua Tree.
Will Falk
Latest posts by Will Falk (see all)
- Time to Escalate? First-Ever Rights of Nature Lawsuit Dismissed - December 7, 2017
- The Rights of Nature and the Power of Law - October 18, 2017
- Why Does the Colorado River Need to Sue For Rights? - September 25, 2017
SDFP welcomes Will Falk to San Diego and the land of Freeps! Many of us are transplants here; many of us have sloughed off who we were, what we did in the last place we lived. So here’s to the process of reinvention and poetry.
Welcome to a land where all us newcomers are rediscovering
the nature of the originals and their relations to the place, and
testifying that history did not start with SDG&E, Jerry Sanders
and the interstates.
See you at the Calabria.
Thank you very much for the welcome. It makes me very happy that others can find something in my poetry and it is an honor to see my poem on SDFP.