what will hold it all 

when old geometries 
lose their starting points 

spilled grains making 
the sound of blowing sand 
filling ears to the brim 

* Burden Basket (plant fibers, 1870-80) by the Pomo tribe
of Indigenous Americans in northern California, USA

Image downloaded from the Art Institute of Chicago, and appears
here under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) license:
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/

Publisher’s Notes:

Corine Pearce, Master Weaver, Pomo by Jackleen de la Harpe at Ecotrust.org
(3 August 2023)

Carrying Baskets: The Seeds of Pomo Life in California by Sherrie Smith-Ferri (Dry Creek Pomo/Coast Miwok Tribal Scholar) at Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (16 December 2021)

The Basket Weavers: Clint McKay & Pomo Basketry, an eight-minute video segment of the “Preserving Traditions” episode of the Bay Area Bountiful series, aired on Northern California Public Media (31 December 2019):

“Everything in our world revolves around baskets. Our ceremonies are performed with baskets. We bathe our babies in baskets. When we go out and gather our food, we gather it in a basket. We store our food and valuable items in a basket. We cook in baskets. We eat out of baskets. We hunt with baskets, we fish with baskets. One of the most precious gifts a Pomo or Wappo person could give you is a basket....”

—Clint McKay, basket weaver and Wappo spiritual leader

Daryl Scroggins

has taught creative writing and literature at The University of Texas at Dallas, The University of North Texas, and the Writer’s Garret, in Dallas. He now lives in Marfa, Texas. He is the author of This Is Not the Way We Came In, a collection of flash fiction and a flash novel (Ravenna Press), Winter Investments: Stories (Trilobite Press), and Prairie Shapes: A Flash Novel (winner of the 2004 Robert J. DeMott Prose Contest). His poems, short stories, and creative nonfictions have appeared in magazines and anthologies across the country, including Blink Ink, Cutbank, Eastern Iowa Review, New Flash Fiction Review, Star 82 Review, and Third Wednesday, among others.

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Suitcase Full of Clay: An Ekphrastic e-Collection in MacQueen’s Quinterly, aka MacQ (Issue 18, April 2023)

⚡ Roadshow, microfiction by Daryl Scroggins in MacQ (Issue 15, September 2022); one of three pieces by Scroggins selected as Finalists in “The Question of Questions” Ekphrastic Writing Challenge

⚡ Spring, microfiction by Scroggins in MacQ (Issue 12, March 2022)

⚡ Writer Boy, microfiction in MacQ (Issue 4, July 2020); nominated by MacQ for Best Microfiction 2021

⚡ Field Trips, flash fiction by Scroggins in KYSO Flash (Issue 12, Summer 2019)

⚡ New to School, microfiction in Eclectica (Jan/Feb 2018)

⚡ Two Fictions: “Almost Baptized” and “Against the Current” in New Flash Fiction Review (Issue 10, January 2018)

⚡ Eight Stories: A Mini-Chapbook by Daryl Scroggins at Web del Sol