Always Coming Home
Page 44
Walks Along said, “Yes, I think they are going now.”
Steady said, “I spoke ill. I will be silent now for a while.” He went down to the River to wash and to be by himself. The others began also to go down to the River, or back to their towns, leaving the Warriors there where the meeting had been, by the cottonwood grove.
The next day the Warriors also went home to their towns.
That was the end of that lodge in the Valley. It was indeed gone.
Why I have written this.
Some of the men who had been Warriors went up to the Dark River country after that meeting, to live with the Condor people. Twenty-four of them went that year, and some more the next year, I am not sure how many. No woman went. There was a woman in Sinshan who had gone to that country earlier with her father, who was a Condor man. She came back after several years. She wrote her life to tell about those people. I do not think much else has ever been written about that time when the Condor men came to the Valley and the Warrior Lodge came to be. I was a quite young man at the meeting at Cottonwood Flats, but I have thought about it a great deal all my life. We avoid talking about sickness when feeling well, but that is superstition, after all. Looking mindfully at the things that were talked about at the meeting, I have come to think that the sickness of Man is like the mutating viruses and the toxins: there will always be some form of it about, or brought in from elsewhere by people moving and travelling, and there will always be the risk of infection. What those sick with it said is true: It is a sickness of our being human, a fearful one. It would be unwise in us to forget the Warriors and the words spoken at Cottonwood Flats, lest it need all be done and said again.
POEMS
FOURTH SECTION
THE POEMS in this section were more or less formally used in ceremonies or in teaching, in the heyimas or as part of the seven great wakwa.
MOON DANCE SONG
Composed by Link of the Obsidian House of Ounmalin and sung there as part of the men s ritual singing before the Moon Dance.
If you should ask me,
you should ask me where
she went, that girl
with fleecy hair.
If I should answer,
I should answer you,
that she lay down
under the moon.
EYEGEONKAMA
A part-song, sung by women before and during the Moon Dance, though not part of the formal ritual singing. Many different versions and improvisations go under the title and to the tune of the “yes-singing.” This version is from Sinshan.
How far from lip to lip?
Wide enough for a word to get out.
How far from lip to lip?
Wide enough for a man to get in.
If the word is yes, yes,
if the word is yes,
if the lips part consenting,
enter in me, yes, yes,
enter in me, yes.
A SONG USED IN CHUMO WHEN DAMMING A CREEK OR DIVERTING WATER TO A HOLDING TANK FOR IRRIGATION
To the ousel, to the water ousel
may it go, may it go.
Tarweed, the corn roots
need this water also.
Buckbrush, the bean leaves
need this water also.
Way of the water’s going,
we do not wish this!
Let it go to the water ousel,
to the waterskater.
Let the wild goose’s wings
carry it upward.
Let the dragonfly larva
carry it downward.
We do not wish this,
we do not desire it,
only the water we borrow
on our way to returning.
We who are doing this
all will be dying.
Way of the water’s going,
bear with us in this place now
on your way to returning.
COMING UPRIVER
A Salt Journey song. Members of the Salt Lodge of the Blue Clay House maintained the Salt Ponds—nine diked enclosures on the mudflats east of the easternmost Mouth of the Na, in which evaporation and crystallisation was controlled in a five-year continuous cycle of drainage from pond to pond. Both crude and refined salt were “in the gift” of the Blue Clay heyimas. A month after the Water was danced, Salt Lodge people from all nine towns made a ceremonial journey downriver to do any heavy repairs that might be needed in the system of ponds and sluices, and to harvest the crimson brine shrimp which, dried and powdered, were used as a condiment.
Coming back, coming up from the mouths of the river,
to the left, in the southwest, blue mountains.
Coming back from the coast of the western ocean,
in the northeast, to the right, blue mountains.
From the flat shores, the beaches of the unborn,
walking back between mountains, coming upriver.
From the salt place, from the edge, from the empty place,
walking back between hills of dry grass, coming upriver.
THE INLAND SEA
Spoken as a teaching in the Serpentine heyimas of Sinshan by Mica.
All there under the water are cities, the old cities.
All the bottom of the sea there is roads and houses,
streets and houses.
Under the mud in the dark of the sea there
books are, bones are.
All those old souls are under the sea there,
under the water, in the mud,
in the old cities in the dark.
There are too many souls there.
Look out if you go by the edge of the sea,
if you go on a boat on the Inland Sea
over the old cities.
You can see the souls of the old dead like cold fire in the water.
They will take any body, the luminifera, the jellyfish, the sandfleas, those old souls.
Any body they can get.
They swim through their windows, they drift down their roads,
in the mud in the dark of the sea.
They rise through the water to sunlight, hungry for birth.
Look out for the sea-foam, young woman,
look out for the sandfleas!
You might find an old soul in your womb,
an old soul, a new person.
There aren’t enough people for all the old souls,
hopping like sandfleas.
Their lives were the sea-waves, their souls are the sea-foam,
foam-lines on brown sand,
there and not there.
TO THE PEOPLE ON THE HILLS
Sung in Wakwaha to the Animals of the Blue Clay on the Second Day of the World Dance.
On four feet, on four feet walking
around the world, walking around
on four feet, you walk
the right way, you walk dancing,
beautifully dancing you walk,
carefully, dangerously you walk
in the right direction.
A MADRONE LODGE SONG
This song, with its matrix-words, takes about an hour to sing. In some songs the matrix-words are “meaningless” syllables or vowels, or are old words no longer in use; in this one they are developed out of the song-words. For instance, after the song is opened with the four-note heya heya, the tune is first hummed: the mmmmm of humming is the first sound of the first word, ma-invetun, from their houses, and it develops gradually into the syllable ma; this is modulated gradually through the “Four-House vowels” backwards as ma-ún, ma-oun, ma-on, ma-un, to ma-in, and at last the whole first word/phrase, ma-invetun, is sung. Other key words of the song are similarly treated or “matricised.”
The words and music of this song belonged to Mica of Sinshan and were given to us by him.
From their houses, from their town
rainbow people come walking
the dark paths between stars,
the bright tracks on water
of the moon, of the sun.
lithe and long-armed,
they follow the fog pumas
beside the wind coyotes,
passing the rain bears
under the still-air hawks
on the paths of sunlight
on the tracks of moonlight,
on the ways of starlight,
on the dark roads.
They climb the ladders of wind,
the stairways of cloud.
They descend the ladders of air,
the steps of rain falling.
The closed eye sees them.
The deaf ear hears them.
The still mouth speaks to them.
The still hand touches them.
Going to sleep we waken to them,
walking the ways of their town.
Dying we live them,
entering their beautiful houses.
BONE POEMS
From the Blue Clay teaching in that heyimas in Wakwaha.
The solution
dissolves itself
leaving the problem behind,
a skeleton,
the mystery before,
around, above, below, within.
O Clarity!
Don’t break your handbones
trying to break mystery.
Pick it up, eat it, use it,
wear it, throw it at coyotes.
The bones of your heart,
there’s mystery.
Clothes wearing the body,
there’s a good clown.
Puzzlebits make whole puzzles.
Answers complete questions.
A whistle, though,
made from the heartbone,
plays the song the crow knows
and won’t sing,
the song called Rejoining.
Oh, I am frightened,
1 am afraid, afraid.
Each night I go in desolation
to a miserable place.
Is there no other way?
I wish I had died young, suddenly,
before I knew I had to make
the bones of my soul
out of cold rain and aching,
and walk into the dark.
From opaque rock
springs clear water.
The skull’s hard cup
holds clarity.
Drink, traveller.
Be mindful. Drink.
TEACHING SONGS: ORDERS AND DANCES OF THE EARTH AND SKY
Such songs were spoken or chanted to the tongue-drum, often with much repetition of lines or words, as part of children s education in the heyimas. They varied from House to House and from town to town; this set is from the Serpentine of Madidinou.
I. THE TOWN OF EARTH
Adobe, blue clay, serpentine, obsidian:
floors and walls
of the houses of the town of earth.
Cloud, rain, wind, air:
windows and roofs
of the houses of the town of earth.
Under floorboards, under cellars,
above roofs, above chimneys,
to the left of the right hand,
to the right of the left hand,
north of the future, south of the past,
earlier than east, later than west,
outside the walls:
the limitless,
the wilderness,
the mountains and rivers of being,
the valley of possibility.
II. THE ROUND TOWN
Ballround, earth-town.
Each street meets
itself at length.
Old are the roads,
long are the ways,
wide are the waters.
Whale swims west returning east,
tern flies north returning south,
rain falls to rise, sparks rise to fall.
Mind may hold the whole
but on foot walking we do not come
to the beginning end of the street.
The hills are steep,
the years are steep,
deep are the waters.
In the round town
it is a long way home.
III. THE COURSES.
Earth goes turning,
earth goes turning spinning,
spinning the day-course
between shining and darkness.
What lies between south and north
is the axis of turning;
what lies from west to east
is the way of turning.
In shining and darkness, so,
turning in shining and darkness.
Moon goes turning,
moon goes turning circling,
moon circles the month-course,
spinning the month-long moon’s day,
between shining and darkness
circling the earth turning and spinning.
Crescent is dawn of the moon’s day,
full moon full noon, waning the evening,
dark of the moon is the moon’s night
that looks at the darkness, so,
turning in shining and darkness.
Earth and moon together,
together the two go turning,
circling the sun,
circling the year-course,
and the slanted axis of turning
making the winter and summer,
the rise and fall of the year-dance.
The dancers, the bright dancers,
Ou, the bright sun-child,
Adsevin, glory of morning, glory of evening,
the dancers, see the bright dancers,
outward from earth, red Kernel,
Gebayu and Udin,
and the lost dancers in darkness
seen by the eye no longer,
turning, circling the shining,
turning in shining and darkness.
NOTE: This description of the solar system might be acted out by young children taking the parts of earth, moon, and the five visible planets, spinning and circling appropriately around the singer, who played the sun.
The next song was not danced or sung, but chanted or spoken to certain drum rhythms. Children learned the first section; the rest was not learned until adolescence; and so familiar and sacred were the words that often they were not spoken at all but “said on the drum”—the rhythms being as distinctive and familiar as the words.
IV. THE GYRES
Around its center in an open gyre
earth turns, the day:
around the earth in an open gyre
moon turns, the month:
around the sun in an open gyre
earth turns, the year:
around its center in an open gyre
sun turns, the dance:
sun and the other stars in an open gyre
turn and return, the dance.
The dancing is stillness,
change without changing,
onward returning.
The dancing is making
mountains and rivers,
stars and the islands of stars
and the unmaking.
The dance is the open gyre
of the gyre of the gyre
of the dance in the valley.
To begin
is to return.
To lose the seed
is the flower.
To learn the stone
touches the spring.
To see the dancing:
starlight.
To hear the dancing:
darkness.
To dance the dancing:
shining, shining.
In the houses
they are dancing.
On the dancing places
they are dancing shining.
ASKING FOR A MESSENGER
An old song, sung with the tongue-drum in the Black Adobe Lodges.
Quail, quail, carry
a word for me.
I cannot, I cannot,
I cannot cross across.
a word for me.
I don’t know, I don’t know
how to cross across.
Pigeon, pigeon, carry
a word for me.
I’ve returned already,
gone there and returned.
Your word is my feather,
my feather is your word.
A GRASS SONG
A Red Adobe song for the Grass Dance in Wakwaha.
The meter is “fives.”
Very quietly
this is happening,
this is becoming,
the hills are changing
under the rainclouds,
inside the grey fogs,
the sun going south
and the wind colder,
blowing quietly
from the west and south.
Manyness of rain
falling quietly:
manyness of grass
rising into air.
The hills become green.
This is happening
very quietly.
CLOUDS, RAIN, AND WIND
A Grass Dance song.
From the house of the Lion that lies on the mountain,
footsteps of the dancers approaching,
hurrying: listen, the footsteps
of Bear dancers hurrying downwards
over the foothills towards us.
Coyote, Coyote follows them,
Coyote howling and singing!
THE ANT DANCE
Sung and danced by children in all Valley towns on the Third Day of the World Dance, “Honey Day” along with the Bee Dance.
A hundred hundred rooms in this house,
A hundred hundred halls in this house,
everybody running, running, running in this house,
everybody touching, touching, touching in this house,
Hey! little grandmothers!
Let me get out of this house!
Let me get out of here!
Hey! Let me out!
THE BEAR’S GIFT
From the Black Adobe Lodge in Wakwaha: a teaching poem. The meter is nine-syllable, a meter particularly associated with Black Adobe verse.
Nobody knows the name of the bear,
not even the bear. Only the ones
who make fires and cry tears know the name
of the bear, that the bear gave to them.
Quail and plumed grass, infant and puma,
all their lives they are wholly alive