I pick up the bar of soap from her sink, the same soap she used yesterday morning to wash her face. When she looked in the mirror, did she know it wo… - Joy Harjo

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I pick up the bar of soap from her sink, the same soap she used yesterday morning to wash her face. When she looked in the mirror, did she know it would be her last sunrise? I move over pill bottles, a clock radio on the table by the bed, a pen, and set down the pan. I straighten the blankets over her, to keep her warm, for dignity. I start with her face. Her face is unlined even two months before her eightieth birthday. She was known for her beauty, and when younger passed for the Cherokee that she was through her mother and her mother’s mother all the way back to time’s beginning. My mother had the iron pot given to her by her Cherokee mother, whose mother gave it to her, given to her by the U.S. government on the Trail of Tears.