03-20-08
ONE DREAM
Should I live for another ten years I will feel very fortunate, but it was not long ago, at the time of European intrusion into this hemisphere, that indigenous upon this entire continent lived a balanced life for 300 snows or more. I was born on the northern half of this western hemisphere. At that time the Elders among us were few and scattered. The diaspora and genocide of indigenous that began at first contact with evil assault tactics birthed upon the European continent and transported here, continues in the year 2008 and there is no solution upon the political horizon that will allow this thought to recede, fade, or vanish: Divide and Conquer. This tactic promoted the invasion and assault of the world, by various Kingdoms demanding gold. In the instance of the initial invaders assaulting this hemisphere, gold in sufficient amounts that would allow the Spanish Crown to purchase an army. That activity of “finding” this hemisphere was first an accident, then grew to become a discovery and land-claim, then was fed to Historians by the crowns to manipulate history to continue the justification of The Doctrine of Discovery and right to destroy humanity while seizing land.
When I was in grade one, beginning my academic journey, I explained to my Elders how Columbus “found” us. A Grandmother looked long at me then asked. “Did this person find the sun, too? This land was never ‘lost’ any more than the sun was lost.”
Should one explore “discovery” and “doctrine” in a worthy dictionary and with a clear mind, s/he will find that the Doctrine of Discovery means that two people can happen upon anything and the first who claims to see it first is the discoverer. In the instance of the western hemisphere, the “discovery was a vast land-area inhabited by 100-million indigenous beings. For the “doctrine” to bear legitimate fruit, one must assume that the 100- millions of indigenous inhabitants upon this western continent were blind! One “civilized” way to fortify this societal myopia is to change the languages of the indigenous and distort their habits and world-views through the process of assimilation/acculturation, an alteration that damages indigenous much is the political strategy of changing our languages and encouraging us to identify a language other than the one we were colonized with as “foreign.”
The history of the penetration of pirates from the European continent, written by the assaulting forces, is accepted by too many history scholars, both foreign and indigenous. That poorly reported and often fabricated chronicle must be questioned, particularly its divide-and-maintain-control mentality that pits languages and cultures against each other in the indigenous arena while dividing families at their spiritual roots.
There are strange, intruding language-forces yet dominating this hemisphere and the indigenous upon this hemisphere, causing one indigenous camp to look askance at the other. The strange languages are English and Spanish. The arrogance of the English language reinforced by the presence of God, and the power of the Spanish language reinforced with the strength of the Catholic Church, are formidable structures to confront, causing an immense division among the indigenous. By employing this strange formula, the English-speaking native and the Spanish speaking native often hold each suspect of being foreign! An English colonized English-speaking native from the north will hold the Spanish colonized Spanish-speaking native from the south in the “foreign” arena even though the Spanish speaking native is a full-blood-native Spanish-speaker and is to a greater degree original native than the English-speaker making the crude and hasty judgment.
This confusion is accomplished by distorting the native languages and world-views. This distortion is accomplished to promote and protect the assumption of “truths” residing in the act of assimilation, and to invite indigenous loyalty to strange beings and their strange habits, actions that continue to erode the gentle spirit among indigenous peoples everywhere. Those invading and foreign habits devoid of protection and promotion would, like an autumn leaf, dry and fall from the present to be raked and discarded in the abyss of uselessness.
Our ancient ancestors that learned from their ancient ancestors who studied this hemisphere and cherished the life-forces said, “Hamis hidatsi (One heart), hamis Aw’te (one people), hamis himal (one mind), hamis ahti (one blood), hamis telamji (one spirit), hamis tasoqjami (one dream), from tip to tip” (meaning, from the tip of South America to the North Pole). In order for the indigenous inhabitants of this western hemisphere to appreciate the boundless love of our ancient beings and conduct our lives and its purposes issued to us as an undamaged dream, this generation must lift the curtain of prejudice smothering our instincts, cast it off, and follow the foot steps of our ancestors, for that path leads to the dawning of our respect and responsibilities as original indigenous dwelling upon this earth. Too, that path will reveal the necessity of our understanding. It is a good path. This path awaits our happy laughter, our delicate songs, our dedicated dances. Hayyaw, (younger brother) Enunja (little sister) it is a dream of Pukemuka (wonderful wise people of our history), therefore it is tijtawa (genuine).
Gedn’ch’lumnu (This must be so).
Sul’ma’ejote
Friday, October 31, 2008
Monday, October 27, 2008
THE GOD WHO CANNOT SMILE
February 14, 1991, 8:11 am, UC, Davis
THE GOD WHO CANNOT SMILE
(A view of a 20th century indigenous person from the shore of this hemisphere to Castile and the Mayflower.)
The news spread quickly across the land. It was whispered in the mountains and in the vast valleys that there might be a fulfilling of the legend concerning Quetzalcoatl, that it appeared he returned from the Morning Star. It is said he promised to return with a vengeance when he was thrust from his homeland, a land which lies to the south and on the sunrise side of the world.
We were certain that the son of Morning Star had returned. We learned that he and his tribe entered the land with much anger and longed to destroy those that had put him out of his position as Cacique. The message came from the south and from the east, as the Mohawk and the Seminole knew of the legend for many seasons, and they, too, waited and wondered.
It is known that Quetzalcoatl was thrust from his domain because he was an honored Cacique and he worked the earth with his people. He gave new methods of growing corn and devised plans for growing cotton of many colors so staining cloth was no longer necessary. With his dreams he created methods of watering the earth and he helped the people grow food and fruit where there was once only a harsh landscape.
Quetzalcoatl taught the people to be good and share the bounty of earth. He said that the bounty of earth belonged to all of the people all of the time and children should be served first at the feast, then the Elders, then the people. He said that this is the manner of survival of the most precious and fragile of our life’s ingredients, the children. The children must eat first because of their youth, the Elders second because of their wisdom and their ability to teach children, and the people that are not yet wise but distant from being a child third, because labor was their love and to feed the children and Elders their honor. Together the people worked the earth and sang songs to the rising sun and to the vastness of the universe, and to all creatures dwelling upon earth and among the stars.
When the Kings and those of great power and jealousy ran Quetzalcoatl out of the land with much anger (because the people truly loved him) he vowed to return with thunder and lightning to re-claim his just position among the people. The lessons say that if he returned on one-deer* he would strike the children, if on one-jaguar,* he would strike all of the people, whomsoever; if on one-reed,* he would strike only Kings. It was during the season of one-reed when destruction came to the land.
Kings trembled.
That is how the lesson came to my people dwelling upon the western edge of our world near thundering waters of outer-ocean. Our creation is beside the crashing, hurrying mountain river and under a canopy of dancing stars where the unknowable dwells forever.
We know they came from the direction of the rising sun and Morning Star. But we also know that they are not Quetzalcoatl. We know they did not return to claim a just seat among the people and within our governing body. We know they do not have the power to love earth and to sing songs at dawn when bright stars look across forever smiling, as the new day is yet a silver-green veil in the east.
They landed in the south on the sunrise side of our world and destroyed the pueblos and the temples and assaulted the pyramids, our dream honoring the Great Powers dwelling within the universe. Their commander was invisible. Their commander gave them orders to destroy our people and to take possession of all our lives. Their commander bade them to take our homeland for a King and Queen dwelling in a distant land. Their God was angry with our people, commanding armies to slaughter us, it is said, in order to save us.
It would be many seasons before we understood their pain and learned more about their angry God. Kings trembled, and those honoring the fierce Kings.
It was not the passing of many seasons when we earned of another entry of strange beings into our homeland. Again we wondered. They entered upon the eastern shore of the great salt waters where the nations of Narragansett roamed in vast numbers under the summer sun, dancing with the beating of their great hearts in a vast circle, singing.
The strangers, too, had an angry invisible God to lead them and to command them. Their God was ferocious and had no tolerance for my people. They, too, came with dreams of destruction and they, too, appeared to have no honor for earth and the knowledge of earth within their being. God told them we had no soul, therefore, it was not only reasonable to destroy us, but by destroying us they would find great glory within His Kingdom.
Their God gave them our homeland and none of our chiefs can remember the season when their God petitioned the council asking for it so He could give it away. But God took it and gave it to strangers who walk upon the earth in anger, feast in anger, think in anger, dream in anger. We wondered and worried long about this God.
What was this two-footer who entered out homeland led by a strange God? What is this God who takes from our people and condemns us as if we had no purpose in dwelling upon earth and singing songs to all of life? What is God doing here? How long will He linger?
All of these questions were before our council gathered at the evening fire. Many council fires burned through the night. The answer refused to appear. The answer, too, was invisible.
We learned to read the speaking leaf and here is what earth children have discovered. It is said there have always been many invisible Gods governing the people dwelling in the lands beyond the salt waters. It is written that all of their Gods are jealous. In anger their God cast them to the winter wind. In anger their God forced them from their homeland. In glorified anger their Gods led them to “promised lands.”
In anger their God wrote laws upon stone for them to abide by. In anger their God pardoned them for bearing many diseases and much sickness to our shores. In anger their Gods crush other nations in order to plant his chosen people upon lands that are precious and sacred to original nations of the world. In anger their God intruded into the lives of many people and bid his flock to follow- seeking neither permission to enter nor pardon for the intrusion.
In anger their God battled with Satan and with other Gods that created war upon war, pit nation against nation, moved tribe against tribe and brother against sister. And when the conflicts were over it was impossible to identify that which was truly of a Satanic nature and that which was truly Godly. The native people of this world have not been able to discern between them. This is what the speaking leaf told us. Charlot of the Flatheads spoke to the council saying.
The speaking page taught us that the wanderings of God were always met with conflict and confrontation. It said long ago His children were ejected from their homeland and God led them through the wilderness. He parted bodies of water so His people might pass through, walking upon earth, as they searched for peace and happiness – and land.
God commanded the people without uttering a sound. And that which worried our Council of Elders most was that God stood far away from the people, dwelling and watching from a distant, invisible place, heaven. Their God was not within their being, not protecting their spirit, not encompassing their purpose, but watched their movements to see if they dared to put another God first. He watched, always alert, always prepared to strike the “flock.”
Yes, they feared God!
Their God thundered unto them that He would condemn them for all seasons if they failed to obey His wishes. Their God told them that the native people were not real, but were cannibals and savages, that we were less than animals; that we dwelled in a world that we knew not how to manage, and that we had no connection between our spirits and the power that turns earth around the sun and sun around a greater wonder still. His word condemned the native people to death.
After being cast from their homeland, those thinking themselves as “pure,” gathered at Scrooby, which is a dwelling place in eastern lands. Soon they were cast from Scrooby and, after a long wandering, the God-people cast their covetous eyes to the shores of my people, the earth of our dreams, the world of our visions. Their God, as had the God of other “children,” promised them land. He did not ask our nations if he and his children could penetrate our domain. He failed to seek permission to enter. He, instead, trespassed into the world of the native nations and issued to his children a right to occupancy and ownership.
They came with their Book-of-One-Great-Law in one diseased hand and disease and guns in the other. From the floating long house called The Flower of Spring, it is said, they entered the land of the Narraganset, the Wampanoag, the Mashpee near the dancing waters called Nantuckett. There the natives fed them. There also, our spirits touched many diseases and much sickness.
In the season of falling leaves they arrived upon the sunrise side of our world. Our people became sick. Many nations perished, many children also. They said they were pure like snow, but upon close examination by our Chiefs and our Councils, we learned that they were diseased and unclean.
Their Chiefs also said they were pure. Chief spoke to the pure saying they must bind together as but a single being, and their bindings must be their love for God and for each other. In this manner they would prosper.
In this manner, their Chief said they would grow to be many upon the land. He spoke saying they would build a shining village upon the hills and their light would never, as the evening sun, fade into shadows. God commanded their Chief and the pure followed every word
They saw this land as a beautiful place created for them alone by their God, but they were not created here, nor was their God. Our Council spoke saying that this cannot be so. The Council said they were intruding and wished for them to go, but they lingered.
And they multiplied. It has been the passing of many winters as there are fingers of many hands. They grew into many people upon our land, more than the leaves of the forest. It is true they have a good life issued to them by their invisible, angry God. It is true they have built many shining villages, one upon every hill they approached.
But there is a truth spoken at the council fire in the purple softness of evening. Our Chief said:
“It is true the eastern people have grown to be many. It is true they have much land and many possessions. It is true they have made huge laws. It is true they have made shining villages upon the thousand hills. But they still do not have happiness. They shall never find happiness for all of the seasons they worship The-God-Who-Cannot-Smile.”
Sul’ma’ejote
THE GOD WHO CANNOT SMILE
(A view of a 20th century indigenous person from the shore of this hemisphere to Castile and the Mayflower.)
The news spread quickly across the land. It was whispered in the mountains and in the vast valleys that there might be a fulfilling of the legend concerning Quetzalcoatl, that it appeared he returned from the Morning Star. It is said he promised to return with a vengeance when he was thrust from his homeland, a land which lies to the south and on the sunrise side of the world.
We were certain that the son of Morning Star had returned. We learned that he and his tribe entered the land with much anger and longed to destroy those that had put him out of his position as Cacique. The message came from the south and from the east, as the Mohawk and the Seminole knew of the legend for many seasons, and they, too, waited and wondered.
It is known that Quetzalcoatl was thrust from his domain because he was an honored Cacique and he worked the earth with his people. He gave new methods of growing corn and devised plans for growing cotton of many colors so staining cloth was no longer necessary. With his dreams he created methods of watering the earth and he helped the people grow food and fruit where there was once only a harsh landscape.
Quetzalcoatl taught the people to be good and share the bounty of earth. He said that the bounty of earth belonged to all of the people all of the time and children should be served first at the feast, then the Elders, then the people. He said that this is the manner of survival of the most precious and fragile of our life’s ingredients, the children. The children must eat first because of their youth, the Elders second because of their wisdom and their ability to teach children, and the people that are not yet wise but distant from being a child third, because labor was their love and to feed the children and Elders their honor. Together the people worked the earth and sang songs to the rising sun and to the vastness of the universe, and to all creatures dwelling upon earth and among the stars.
When the Kings and those of great power and jealousy ran Quetzalcoatl out of the land with much anger (because the people truly loved him) he vowed to return with thunder and lightning to re-claim his just position among the people. The lessons say that if he returned on one-deer* he would strike the children, if on one-jaguar,* he would strike all of the people, whomsoever; if on one-reed,* he would strike only Kings. It was during the season of one-reed when destruction came to the land.
Kings trembled.
That is how the lesson came to my people dwelling upon the western edge of our world near thundering waters of outer-ocean. Our creation is beside the crashing, hurrying mountain river and under a canopy of dancing stars where the unknowable dwells forever.
We know they came from the direction of the rising sun and Morning Star. But we also know that they are not Quetzalcoatl. We know they did not return to claim a just seat among the people and within our governing body. We know they do not have the power to love earth and to sing songs at dawn when bright stars look across forever smiling, as the new day is yet a silver-green veil in the east.
They landed in the south on the sunrise side of our world and destroyed the pueblos and the temples and assaulted the pyramids, our dream honoring the Great Powers dwelling within the universe. Their commander was invisible. Their commander gave them orders to destroy our people and to take possession of all our lives. Their commander bade them to take our homeland for a King and Queen dwelling in a distant land. Their God was angry with our people, commanding armies to slaughter us, it is said, in order to save us.
It would be many seasons before we understood their pain and learned more about their angry God. Kings trembled, and those honoring the fierce Kings.
It was not the passing of many seasons when we earned of another entry of strange beings into our homeland. Again we wondered. They entered upon the eastern shore of the great salt waters where the nations of Narragansett roamed in vast numbers under the summer sun, dancing with the beating of their great hearts in a vast circle, singing.
The strangers, too, had an angry invisible God to lead them and to command them. Their God was ferocious and had no tolerance for my people. They, too, came with dreams of destruction and they, too, appeared to have no honor for earth and the knowledge of earth within their being. God told them we had no soul, therefore, it was not only reasonable to destroy us, but by destroying us they would find great glory within His Kingdom.
Their God gave them our homeland and none of our chiefs can remember the season when their God petitioned the council asking for it so He could give it away. But God took it and gave it to strangers who walk upon the earth in anger, feast in anger, think in anger, dream in anger. We wondered and worried long about this God.
What was this two-footer who entered out homeland led by a strange God? What is this God who takes from our people and condemns us as if we had no purpose in dwelling upon earth and singing songs to all of life? What is God doing here? How long will He linger?
All of these questions were before our council gathered at the evening fire. Many council fires burned through the night. The answer refused to appear. The answer, too, was invisible.
We learned to read the speaking leaf and here is what earth children have discovered. It is said there have always been many invisible Gods governing the people dwelling in the lands beyond the salt waters. It is written that all of their Gods are jealous. In anger their God cast them to the winter wind. In anger their God forced them from their homeland. In glorified anger their Gods led them to “promised lands.”
In anger their God wrote laws upon stone for them to abide by. In anger their God pardoned them for bearing many diseases and much sickness to our shores. In anger their Gods crush other nations in order to plant his chosen people upon lands that are precious and sacred to original nations of the world. In anger their God intruded into the lives of many people and bid his flock to follow- seeking neither permission to enter nor pardon for the intrusion.
In anger their God battled with Satan and with other Gods that created war upon war, pit nation against nation, moved tribe against tribe and brother against sister. And when the conflicts were over it was impossible to identify that which was truly of a Satanic nature and that which was truly Godly. The native people of this world have not been able to discern between them. This is what the speaking leaf told us. Charlot of the Flatheads spoke to the council saying.
“We were happy when he first came. We first thought he came from the light; but he comes like the dusk of evening, not the dawn of morning. He comes like a day that has passed and night enters the future with him.”
The speaking page taught us that the wanderings of God were always met with conflict and confrontation. It said long ago His children were ejected from their homeland and God led them through the wilderness. He parted bodies of water so His people might pass through, walking upon earth, as they searched for peace and happiness – and land.
God commanded the people without uttering a sound. And that which worried our Council of Elders most was that God stood far away from the people, dwelling and watching from a distant, invisible place, heaven. Their God was not within their being, not protecting their spirit, not encompassing their purpose, but watched their movements to see if they dared to put another God first. He watched, always alert, always prepared to strike the “flock.”
Yes, they feared God!
Their God thundered unto them that He would condemn them for all seasons if they failed to obey His wishes. Their God told them that the native people were not real, but were cannibals and savages, that we were less than animals; that we dwelled in a world that we knew not how to manage, and that we had no connection between our spirits and the power that turns earth around the sun and sun around a greater wonder still. His word condemned the native people to death.
After being cast from their homeland, those thinking themselves as “pure,” gathered at Scrooby, which is a dwelling place in eastern lands. Soon they were cast from Scrooby and, after a long wandering, the God-people cast their covetous eyes to the shores of my people, the earth of our dreams, the world of our visions. Their God, as had the God of other “children,” promised them land. He did not ask our nations if he and his children could penetrate our domain. He failed to seek permission to enter. He, instead, trespassed into the world of the native nations and issued to his children a right to occupancy and ownership.
They came with their Book-of-One-Great-Law in one diseased hand and disease and guns in the other. From the floating long house called The Flower of Spring, it is said, they entered the land of the Narraganset, the Wampanoag, the Mashpee near the dancing waters called Nantuckett. There the natives fed them. There also, our spirits touched many diseases and much sickness.
In the season of falling leaves they arrived upon the sunrise side of our world. Our people became sick. Many nations perished, many children also. They said they were pure like snow, but upon close examination by our Chiefs and our Councils, we learned that they were diseased and unclean.
Their Chiefs also said they were pure. Chief spoke to the pure saying they must bind together as but a single being, and their bindings must be their love for God and for each other. In this manner they would prosper.
In this manner, their Chief said they would grow to be many upon the land. He spoke saying they would build a shining village upon the hills and their light would never, as the evening sun, fade into shadows. God commanded their Chief and the pure followed every word
They saw this land as a beautiful place created for them alone by their God, but they were not created here, nor was their God. Our Council spoke saying that this cannot be so. The Council said they were intruding and wished for them to go, but they lingered.
And they multiplied. It has been the passing of many winters as there are fingers of many hands. They grew into many people upon our land, more than the leaves of the forest. It is true they have a good life issued to them by their invisible, angry God. It is true they have built many shining villages, one upon every hill they approached.
But there is a truth spoken at the council fire in the purple softness of evening. Our Chief said:
“It is true the eastern people have grown to be many. It is true they have much land and many possessions. It is true they have made huge laws. It is true they have made shining villages upon the thousand hills. But they still do not have happiness. They shall never find happiness for all of the seasons they worship The-God-Who-Cannot-Smile.”
Sul’ma’ejote
Trees of Peace
Summer (June), 1972
United Nations Conference on Human Environment,
Stockholm (Skarpnak), Sweden
THE TREES OF PEACE
O’Stockholm I dreamed long of you
Dwelling beside the laughing waters
O’ Scandinavia, the land of my fairytales
Scandinavia! The land that captured my thoughts long ago.
As I dreamed,
you have children of mettle dwelling among you
I know because I have seen it in youe eyes,
the fire living in your hearts
But for many days the mannequin spoke
more often to my ears than did the people
And many days the mannequin listened
to the message I brought to these shores
Often the mannequin looked with happy eyes upon the world
and that happiness as not in the eyes of the people
It is a sad thing to see empty eyes
It is a sad thing to see eyes not shining
for the heart cannot be smiling if the eyes do not shine
Stockholm, I spoke to one of your children of this emptiness
“Why is it the people of this land appear to be unhappy
their eyes do not shine
their hearts do not dance
they do not smile?”
“They are wrapped in a blanket,
a blanket of security,
That is why they do not smile”
“Who wrapped them in this blanket?”
“The state
the state and the city”
“Then the people are not wrapped, they are robbed!
There has been a crime committed against them, a theft!”
As the few stars looked through the dark sky
I thought long of the words
And looked again into the eyes of Stockholm
And looked again into the eyes of the mannequin
It is true
Many of you have been robbed
A crime has been committed against you
I fasted, praying there would come
a person with sparkling eyes and lively smile
with fire in the heart
and leaping and dancing in the eyes
This much I found in Finland
and I found so much more in Denmark
then I found it in Stockholm
My heart danced
because it takes but one person
with fire to complete the Great Circle
that holds the world
You are now in the circle, Stockholm
and you need not fear
Smile upon your neighbors and upon all children
Look with the eyes of your heart
and you will find a world of miracles
and you can begin building rainbows
A rainbow
Of truth
Of revolution
Of freedom
Of knowledge
Of faith
For this is the circular path of peace
And we must make it larger
If you cannot walk the great circle, then dance
If you cannot dance the great circle, then sing
You can
if your heart is pure
think of the great circle
and by thinking you become part of the great rainbow
and you become a part of the sun
and a part of the darkness
and a part of the thousand suns and the thousand universes
And to remind you of the beauty of the circle
so you will never forget
that the spirits directed us to this land with a mission
we have been instructed to leave you some life,
life and plans for living
You will never forget the four directions
You will never forget the four seasons
this is a beautiful thing to remember
for they are the heart-beat of the Great Circle
At Vadisluden (a public park in Stockholm)
we plant four trees
One for freedom
because people must change the heart-beat
of the world so it is a good thing
and this must not be done with trembling,
and do not be afraid to say, “Revolution!”
One for knowledge and wisdom
given by our elders
and you will know where this comes from
and you will go and get it for your children
One for faith
so you will have faith in freedom
and understanding
and in revolution
One for truth, and silence and loneliness and hunger
so you will never walk alone
and you will forever hunger for knowledge
and in silence you will find truth and trust
Silence is the language spoken at the Great Council
as we sit in a circle
around a fire larger than the sun
This is what we leave you with
In our giving
we also receive a great goodness
of silence and of sunshine
Stockholm, long is our journey to our homeland
across the great salt waters
We must go
As we go we walk softly upon Mother Earth
we ask that you do this forever also
Our hearts smile that we do not leave you
Alone.
Sul’ma’ejote
United Nations Conference on Human Environment,
Stockholm (Skarpnak), Sweden
THE TREES OF PEACE
O’Stockholm I dreamed long of you
Dwelling beside the laughing waters
O’ Scandinavia, the land of my fairytales
Scandinavia! The land that captured my thoughts long ago.
As I dreamed,
you have children of mettle dwelling among you
I know because I have seen it in youe eyes,
the fire living in your hearts
But for many days the mannequin spoke
more often to my ears than did the people
And many days the mannequin listened
to the message I brought to these shores
Often the mannequin looked with happy eyes upon the world
and that happiness as not in the eyes of the people
It is a sad thing to see empty eyes
It is a sad thing to see eyes not shining
for the heart cannot be smiling if the eyes do not shine
Stockholm, I spoke to one of your children of this emptiness
“Why is it the people of this land appear to be unhappy
their eyes do not shine
their hearts do not dance
they do not smile?”
“They are wrapped in a blanket,
a blanket of security,
That is why they do not smile”
“Who wrapped them in this blanket?”
“The state
the state and the city”
“Then the people are not wrapped, they are robbed!
There has been a crime committed against them, a theft!”
As the few stars looked through the dark sky
I thought long of the words
And looked again into the eyes of Stockholm
And looked again into the eyes of the mannequin
It is true
Many of you have been robbed
A crime has been committed against you
I fasted, praying there would come
a person with sparkling eyes and lively smile
with fire in the heart
and leaping and dancing in the eyes
This much I found in Finland
and I found so much more in Denmark
then I found it in Stockholm
My heart danced
because it takes but one person
with fire to complete the Great Circle
that holds the world
You are now in the circle, Stockholm
and you need not fear
Smile upon your neighbors and upon all children
Look with the eyes of your heart
and you will find a world of miracles
and you can begin building rainbows
A rainbow
Of truth
Of revolution
Of freedom
Of knowledge
Of faith
For this is the circular path of peace
And we must make it larger
If you cannot walk the great circle, then dance
If you cannot dance the great circle, then sing
You can
if your heart is pure
think of the great circle
and by thinking you become part of the great rainbow
and you become a part of the sun
and a part of the darkness
and a part of the thousand suns and the thousand universes
And to remind you of the beauty of the circle
so you will never forget
that the spirits directed us to this land with a mission
we have been instructed to leave you some life,
life and plans for living
You will never forget the four directions
You will never forget the four seasons
this is a beautiful thing to remember
for they are the heart-beat of the Great Circle
At Vadisluden (a public park in Stockholm)
we plant four trees
One for freedom
because people must change the heart-beat
of the world so it is a good thing
and this must not be done with trembling,
and do not be afraid to say, “Revolution!”
One for knowledge and wisdom
given by our elders
and you will know where this comes from
and you will go and get it for your children
One for faith
so you will have faith in freedom
and understanding
and in revolution
One for truth, and silence and loneliness and hunger
so you will never walk alone
and you will forever hunger for knowledge
and in silence you will find truth and trust
Silence is the language spoken at the Great Council
as we sit in a circle
around a fire larger than the sun
This is what we leave you with
In our giving
we also receive a great goodness
of silence and of sunshine
Stockholm, long is our journey to our homeland
across the great salt waters
We must go
As we go we walk softly upon Mother Earth
we ask that you do this forever also
Our hearts smile that we do not leave you
Alone.
Sul’ma’ejote
Machu Picchu
October 22, 2008, San Jose, CA
A LETTER TO “BABY” FROM AKON (Grampa).
[Cuauhxihuitl’s journey. End of June 08, lv: San Jose, destination, MachuPicchu, Peru. Oct 23, 08, nearing Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Goal: To become a better person. Soon home in San Jose]
Sweet little Blue Eagle, greetings,
I have just reread your latest blog and my spirit is full of a sweet expectation that awaits you at Cusco and Machu Picchu. Akon’s old and weak heart is strengthened by your accomplishments and longs to dance in the plaza at Machu Picchu with yours, for I know that you dance for each of us, even as you dream for us all.
Soon this part of your life’s journey will come to a close but many other challenges will automatically open to and for you. Your journey, while unimportant to Science and “progress,” are an immense contribution to the indigenous experience upon this hemisphere, for you have moved the northern and southern hemispheres closer, weakening imitation boundaries that have, for too long, been erected by foreigners to keep us apart and vulnerable. That you respond to the ancient voices that call you will never be a part of Science or History, but they should be, because, in the final analysis, those precious people who have been placed upon your path at the precise moment to cause your journey to be a continual fulfillment of your deeper purpose, guide you for each of us, also.
There is much we cannot know and there is so much you must cause us to remember about our places in the universe and our responsibility to Mother Earth, for we will all be healthier and more everlasting because of it. And one day those reading this letter may see the seeds of our future being planted by you and cultivated by the Great Universal Powers and at the maturing of that planting, find a tender, wholesome harvest. Following your example, one day earth’s children will sing a love song to Mother Earth. The universe will respond to their love, Juyjowa (badness) will vanish, and Earth’s sweet powers will continue.
Soon I will hold you, see love dancing in your eyes, and feel the power that surges through you that has earth’s children as its intention, and it will be so good.
The butterflies in the meadow will chorus to your accomplishments, the bees will make sweeter honey and the blossoms will produce a bounty for the earth’s children. Eagles will sing with the fluffy clouds, the fawn will dance while drinking from the fresh water mountain spring, salmon will glisten all of the colors of a rainbow, and earth’s children will pray at dawn with open hearts, weeping.
For now, enter Cusco and Machu Picchu as our Ambassador, and as our Princess, for the great mountain and the stones of the temple have waited long for your appearance. Then hurry home for it has been too long, too, since you walked with us and from here, smiled upon the dawn and the sunrise. Akon
A LETTER TO “BABY” FROM AKON (Grampa).
[Cuauhxihuitl’s journey. End of June 08, lv: San Jose, destination, MachuPicchu, Peru. Oct 23, 08, nearing Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Goal: To become a better person. Soon home in San Jose]
Sweet little Blue Eagle, greetings,
I have just reread your latest blog and my spirit is full of a sweet expectation that awaits you at Cusco and Machu Picchu. Akon’s old and weak heart is strengthened by your accomplishments and longs to dance in the plaza at Machu Picchu with yours, for I know that you dance for each of us, even as you dream for us all.
Soon this part of your life’s journey will come to a close but many other challenges will automatically open to and for you. Your journey, while unimportant to Science and “progress,” are an immense contribution to the indigenous experience upon this hemisphere, for you have moved the northern and southern hemispheres closer, weakening imitation boundaries that have, for too long, been erected by foreigners to keep us apart and vulnerable. That you respond to the ancient voices that call you will never be a part of Science or History, but they should be, because, in the final analysis, those precious people who have been placed upon your path at the precise moment to cause your journey to be a continual fulfillment of your deeper purpose, guide you for each of us, also.
There is much we cannot know and there is so much you must cause us to remember about our places in the universe and our responsibility to Mother Earth, for we will all be healthier and more everlasting because of it. And one day those reading this letter may see the seeds of our future being planted by you and cultivated by the Great Universal Powers and at the maturing of that planting, find a tender, wholesome harvest. Following your example, one day earth’s children will sing a love song to Mother Earth. The universe will respond to their love, Juyjowa (badness) will vanish, and Earth’s sweet powers will continue.
Soon I will hold you, see love dancing in your eyes, and feel the power that surges through you that has earth’s children as its intention, and it will be so good.
The butterflies in the meadow will chorus to your accomplishments, the bees will make sweeter honey and the blossoms will produce a bounty for the earth’s children. Eagles will sing with the fluffy clouds, the fawn will dance while drinking from the fresh water mountain spring, salmon will glisten all of the colors of a rainbow, and earth’s children will pray at dawn with open hearts, weeping.
For now, enter Cusco and Machu Picchu as our Ambassador, and as our Princess, for the great mountain and the stones of the temple have waited long for your appearance. Then hurry home for it has been too long, too, since you walked with us and from here, smiled upon the dawn and the sunrise. Akon
WITH COLUMBUS’ PENETRATION, MANY THINGS HAVE CHANGED
WITH COLUMBUS’ PENETRATION, MANY THINGS HAVE CHANGED
It was the season of Apnui (flowered Summer), 516 years after Columbus’ crude penetration into this hemisphere. Sun seemed happy talking with a pleasant and endless powder-blue sky. Soft breaths of wind stirred small ripples across the mirror-surface of the vast and powerful ocean, seeming to slumber in the warmth of the day. It was a pot-luck early dinner encouraged into being by members of the Santa Cruz Indian Council.
It is true. We had clam chowder when we should have had fresh abalone and mussels.
It is true we had contemporary salad when we should have had
seaweed, dandelions and the stomach contents from a freshly taken deer.
It is true we had mashed potatoes when we should have had crushed, boiled seeds from a thousand different abundant plants from the thousand hills.
It is true we had fried chicken when we should have had roasted turtle.
It is true that we had bottled water from the nearby grocery store instead of a basket of water from the nearby fresh-water spring.
It is true that we had cookies and pie instead of a basket of honey we dipped with two fingers, moving it quickly to our mouths like thin, delicious poi.
It seems that our entire diets have been drastically changed because of the great wisdoms found in “civilization.” And in the civilization of the water and the landscape. The vast ocean has been polluted with much waste and today a cautious mother will not allow her children to bathe there, or even wade. The fresh-water springs from earth are damaged and dried up. The ocean is stripped of abalone and the ocean floor is raked clean of clams, shrimp and other creatures out of ecological balance. Turtles no longer lay eggs for their generations to continue. The seaweed is more polluted than the ocean. The variety of seeds upon the many hills atrophy because the air is polluted and often the rain, too. It is difficult to locate real honey nowadays, but every grocery store has an endless variety of “cultured” honey that is not created from flower nectars but from bees in captivity with only sugar-water to knead their honey from.
So many things have changed since the European violation of the western hemisphere, too many to list or remember.
But there was something at that little dinner on the beach that is neither rare nor
atrophying, love. The love between a variety of earth’s people, and the love of our breaths to freely partake of and share the sweetness of our existence and to share our sweeter, sometimes concealed, emotions of fellowship and affection; the love that has deep, untouchable, delicious roots I our hearts, tingly roots that are mysteriously connected to the universe.
Love and dreams made the beans so tender and delicious beyond memory. Love and dreams made the mashed potatoes a fork full of sweet emotions that fed our famished spirits. Love and dreams made the carefully selected ingredients of the salad seem as carefully fashioned as an expression of joy from a lovely child.
That delicate yet eternal love spilled over into my three-hour lecture on the mountain top, which spilled over into the additional hour of sweet chaos after the talk ended, while we gathered under a full moon, fire-red sunset long embers
In 1850, just two hundred years ago, the California legislature passed a series of laws making it an honorable duty to kill indigenous and the bounty for that noble service was the same as for a coyote scalp, $5.00. Today, standing under the sun watching a happiness welding many thoughts into one emotion, this indigenous person flipped through our history seeing many changes to our lives. Standing on the sands, under a vast and silken sky, before a relaxed and endless ocean, laughter exploding all around, I looked far past the powder blue sky to the universe that begins in infinity and touches the infinity within each of our hearts. I thanked Aponiha for the precious moments we had the pleasure to experience, for joining us, and for the love that is in abundance, holding us each just near enough to sun that life is mostly beautiful, but I thanked the Great Powers especially for issuing us each the wisdom to cultivate that sweet emotion I our deeper selves that neither can be altered nor polluted.
Yes, many things have changed since the adventures of Columbus, but love has not. Watching the children run and hearing them scream with delight, wrapped in a protective mantle of open sky, my heart cried.
Thank you Santa Cruz Indian Council, special friends, students of Stan Rushworth’s valued class at Cabrillo college, Santa Cruz, and the Santa Cruz community at large that participated with us on that tender day in October, 2008.
Sul’ma’ejote
Aka, Darryl Babe Wilson
It was the season of Apnui (flowered Summer), 516 years after Columbus’ crude penetration into this hemisphere. Sun seemed happy talking with a pleasant and endless powder-blue sky. Soft breaths of wind stirred small ripples across the mirror-surface of the vast and powerful ocean, seeming to slumber in the warmth of the day. It was a pot-luck early dinner encouraged into being by members of the Santa Cruz Indian Council.
It is true. We had clam chowder when we should have had fresh abalone and mussels.
It is true we had contemporary salad when we should have had
seaweed, dandelions and the stomach contents from a freshly taken deer.
It is true we had mashed potatoes when we should have had crushed, boiled seeds from a thousand different abundant plants from the thousand hills.
It is true we had fried chicken when we should have had roasted turtle.
It is true that we had bottled water from the nearby grocery store instead of a basket of water from the nearby fresh-water spring.
It is true that we had cookies and pie instead of a basket of honey we dipped with two fingers, moving it quickly to our mouths like thin, delicious poi.
It seems that our entire diets have been drastically changed because of the great wisdoms found in “civilization.” And in the civilization of the water and the landscape. The vast ocean has been polluted with much waste and today a cautious mother will not allow her children to bathe there, or even wade. The fresh-water springs from earth are damaged and dried up. The ocean is stripped of abalone and the ocean floor is raked clean of clams, shrimp and other creatures out of ecological balance. Turtles no longer lay eggs for their generations to continue. The seaweed is more polluted than the ocean. The variety of seeds upon the many hills atrophy because the air is polluted and often the rain, too. It is difficult to locate real honey nowadays, but every grocery store has an endless variety of “cultured” honey that is not created from flower nectars but from bees in captivity with only sugar-water to knead their honey from.
So many things have changed since the European violation of the western hemisphere, too many to list or remember.
But there was something at that little dinner on the beach that is neither rare nor
atrophying, love. The love between a variety of earth’s people, and the love of our breaths to freely partake of and share the sweetness of our existence and to share our sweeter, sometimes concealed, emotions of fellowship and affection; the love that has deep, untouchable, delicious roots I our hearts, tingly roots that are mysteriously connected to the universe.
Love and dreams made the beans so tender and delicious beyond memory. Love and dreams made the mashed potatoes a fork full of sweet emotions that fed our famished spirits. Love and dreams made the carefully selected ingredients of the salad seem as carefully fashioned as an expression of joy from a lovely child.
That delicate yet eternal love spilled over into my three-hour lecture on the mountain top, which spilled over into the additional hour of sweet chaos after the talk ended, while we gathered under a full moon, fire-red sunset long embers
In 1850, just two hundred years ago, the California legislature passed a series of laws making it an honorable duty to kill indigenous and the bounty for that noble service was the same as for a coyote scalp, $5.00. Today, standing under the sun watching a happiness welding many thoughts into one emotion, this indigenous person flipped through our history seeing many changes to our lives. Standing on the sands, under a vast and silken sky, before a relaxed and endless ocean, laughter exploding all around, I looked far past the powder blue sky to the universe that begins in infinity and touches the infinity within each of our hearts. I thanked Aponiha for the precious moments we had the pleasure to experience, for joining us, and for the love that is in abundance, holding us each just near enough to sun that life is mostly beautiful, but I thanked the Great Powers especially for issuing us each the wisdom to cultivate that sweet emotion I our deeper selves that neither can be altered nor polluted.
Yes, many things have changed since the adventures of Columbus, but love has not. Watching the children run and hearing them scream with delight, wrapped in a protective mantle of open sky, my heart cried.
Thank you Santa Cruz Indian Council, special friends, students of Stan Rushworth’s valued class at Cabrillo college, Santa Cruz, and the Santa Cruz community at large that participated with us on that tender day in October, 2008.
Sul’ma’ejote
Aka, Darryl Babe Wilson
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