1I don’t understand this kindergartenassignment: “Draw Your Clan.”The three letters live in abstraction.A friend suggests mine looks like his, minuslegs, and that day I believe my clan isa species of amputee Snipes, birdsforced to fly the skies forever, and Iwonder if we are meant to symbolizeendurance or something beyondmy five-year-old comprehension.                                        2My mother explains we are not leglessbirds and if she had a more worldlyvocabulary she would have suggestedwe were ambiguous, not quite a fish,more than a water snake, but she sayswe are among the few. The last Tuscarora Eeldied out a generation ago, so we are leftOnondaga Eels among the Tuscarora,voiceless as well as legless.                                        3I find an encyclopedia photo,see jagged rows of razor teethin a mouth perpetually grinningand when I show it to her, she saysclans are a system to keep trackof families, so we don’t inadvertentlymarry our relatives, and that we have nomore affinity with eels than anyone elseon the reservation has with their animals.                                        4“If I threw you in the dike,” she says“you’d drown as fast as anyone else,” donewith this lesson. I remember older cousins,swimming between my legs, and suddenly I am rising,their hands grabbing my knees as my balls collidewith the backs of their necks, and they breakthe surface, toss me into deeper water, probablywatching to make sure I surface, after they’ve hadsome amusement at my struggle.                                        5In wet darkness, I imagine openingmy eyes and mouth, taking water in,filling my lungs, discovering gillslike Aquaman or Namor, the Sub-mariner.Knowing I had better odds of dying, face down,no voice to call out for help, I amnever quite brave enough to try it, not daringenough, even, to open my eyes when my face breaksthe stillness of river water contained.                                        6But I flip on my back, ears below the surface, listento mysteries, breathe shallowly at that level, and float,wondering what it would be like to glide the depthson fins, knowing if I were there, I would desirelegs and lungs, and then I fill my chest to capacity,and dive, loving and begrudging the ache I find there,the throbbing of my chest begging for release,and I swim back up, eyes still closed, wondering howlong it will take to find the surface again.