Fall 2009 TCJ STUDENT EDITION
subscribe to Tribal College Journal
TCJ Student is an annual publication of Tribal College Journal. Both the journal and this student issue are published by the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, an organization of the 37 tribally controlled colleges and universities in the United States and Canada.
© Copyright 2009 by Tribal College Journal
Student Edition editor: Esther Belin (Diné), a writer and two-dimensional artist, teaches in the Writing Program at Fort Lewis College. In 2000, she won the American Book Award for her first book of poetry, From the Belly of My Beauty. She lives in Durango, CO with her four daughters and husband.
ON THE COVER: HORSES OF BEADS, STONES, AND SHELL. This necklace was designed by artist Craig Kelly (Diné) when he was a student at the Institute of American Indian Arts; he is now an alumnus. The jeweler creates 3-D work out of mixed media. Courtesy photo.
2009 Student Writing Contest winners
Introduction by Joseph M. Marshall, III
The Fishing Trip By Stephanie A. Fisher
Lonesome Jissom Testament By Richard John Thompson
Loss of a Language—Forgotten Through Time By Georgenia Earring-Chosa
Leaves in October By Gerri L. Williams
The Savage Heart By Patrick Austin Freeland
Maang By Melanie Howick Erickson
Bad Medicine Whistle By Dave Madden
A Whole Person By Dave Madden
Page 2
Wakarusa By Ruth Laws McLain
Grandma By Laura Loyd
The Flaming Chicken By Winston Cambridge
Ode to the Rocket By Winston Cambridge
Beloved Stomp Dance By Tricia Fields
St. Norbert Swam in the Mill Pond By Justin Gauthier
Transformations By Merissa Storey
Equator By Ross D. Luther
Page 3
My Battle Wound By Desirae Grignon
These are Fancy Times By Clifford Stone, Jr.
Hesitation By Ruth Laws McLain
Coffee Break By Sydney Ice
On a Winter’s Day By Dave Madden
Julia By Michael Grant Allen
Novelty By Amanda Irvine-Louie
Page 4
Healing Dance By Guy Reiter
Dream Quest By Alrick Wadena
Bro, Where’s My Wallet? By Ross D. Luther
A Silent Journey By Kathryn Aspaas
Addiction By Melanie Howick Erickson
Keep It Simple Stupid By Damien Moore
Kaekoh Wēskiwat By Guy Reiter
 Stephanie Fisher |
The Fishing Trip
By Stephanie A. Fisher
The sun was barely over the horizon when I began to pack my Blazer for my annual fishing trip; every year in the early summer I took a couple of days off from work and went fishing. Usually it was just me, and sometimes my dog, but this year I would be taking my 8-year-old nephew. He had been living with me off and on his entire life, but last fall the move became permanent. It will be nice to have some company this fishing trip, I thought, other than my dog.
The sun’s light was shining on the high peaks of the Rocky Mountains, and the snow at the very top of the peaks was glowing white, almost blinding white. A light breeze blew in from the west. I closed my eyes and breathed in deeply the scents of early summer: the damp earth, the snow, the dew, the clean smell of Mother Earth and northern Montana. I sent up a silent prayer of thanks for this beautiful morning and finished packing the Blazer.
The front door slammed and I looked up to see my nephew sleepily dragging his feet to the Blazer, carrying his tackle box.
"Hey kid! Are you ready?” I said as a greeting.
"Yeah, where are we going?” he asked as he opened the Blazer door.
"To Duck Lake, not far, only about 40 miles north of here, remember, we’ve been there before,” I replied, walking towards the house.
"I’ll be right back, I’m just going to make sure everything is off and locked up,” I called.
I turned everything off in the house and locked all the windows and doors. I climbed into the driver’s side of the Blazer, closed the door and buckled my seatbelt. I looked at my nephew and told him, "Buckle your seatbelt, my boy.”
I waited until he was buckled in before I backed out of my rutted dirt driveway. I drove to the end of my street and stopped, then turned left. I glanced at my nephew.
I could tell he was thinking about something, which really wasn’t unusual for Shelton. I had noticed that he was a thinker. Even as a baby, he seemed to be a deep thinker and more curious than the other children in my family. It was a trait I encouraged in him – to always ask questions, to think for himself. He never asked easy questions, but kept me busy looking up answers for him or trying to figure out how to best explain things.
"So, are you excited?” I asked him as I stopped at the red light on Highway 2.
"Yeah,” he replied.
"Well, you don’t sound excited. What’s wrong, anything I can help with?” I offered.
"Just thinking,” he said.
"About what?” I asked as I pulled into the intersection.
Shelton shrugged his shoulders and mumbled, "Just stuff.”
"Okay,” I said. I knew not to push the issue with Shelton. He would tell when he was ready.
We drove in silence past Ick’s bar where the street people were already hanging out around the side of the building. We drove up to the hospital road, turned right toward County Road 464, the Duck Lake road. We were almost to the "C” store near Glacier Homes when Shelton turned to look at me.
"Auntie, why do you love me?” he asked.
I knew it wasn’t going to be an easy question, and I knew an easy answer wouldn’t do. I couldn’t just say something like, "I just do.” Shelton would never accept an answer like that, so I took a deep breath, turned and briefly looked into his deep brown eyes.
"Well, my boy, I love you for a lot of reasons,” I began.
"Like what?” he interrupted.
"I love you, because you are my little sister’s son, and I love your mom very much. I started loving you the day she told me she was pregnant with you. I love you for the boy you are. You are compassionate, polite, kind, very respectful. You are a thinker, and very wise for your age. All these things I love about you. I love you for the man you will become. It is so hard to describe love, Shelton. It is something you feel, and experience. The love I have for you is immeasurable, and I can’t pinpoint just one thing about you that I love or even why I love you. I am not very articulate when it comes to explaining emotions. Do you kind of understand what I am saying? Shelton, I will love you forever. It will never die or go away, and it’s not a conditional love. That means I will love you no matter what.”
"Oh I think I understand,” replied Shelton as he looked out the window.
We dropped down into the Milk River Valley and Shelton looked up at an eagle flying higher overhead.
"The cool thing about you, Shelton, is that you are the past, present and future. You are all our ancestors’ hopes, dreams and love,” I said.
Shelton looked at me in surprise, "My ancestors loved me?”
I smiled, "Yes they do. You are all their hopes and dreams, everything they believed in, everything they fought for, everything they died for. You are the reason they ever existed at all, and for that they love you. Pretty cool, huh?”
"Yeah, pretty cool,” replied Shelton in an awed voice.
I slowed down, flipped the signals on, and pulled onto the dirt road that leads to Duck Lake. The lake reflected the mountain in its blue, glassy depths. Shelton sat forward and looked at the lake.
"Auntie, how many fish live in Duck Lake?”
Stephanie A. Fisher (Blackfeet) is enrolled at Blackfeet Community College in Browning, MT, where she is majoring in education. Her goal is to earn a master’s degree in education, and "teach on a reservation somewhere in the United States.” Fisher adds, "I started writing at an early age, I was very shy and did not like to speak, so I expressed myself by writing, and it has become a habit that I still practice.”
 Richard John Thompson |
Lonesome Jissom Testament
By Richard John Thompson
Tonight
the Moon is an Indian
searching this city
for women and a strong drink.
His face is obscured by blue
clouds of cigarette smoke.
He speaks insect dialects,
chirping and clicking dirty things
into the ears of any girl
drunk enough to understand.
Tonight the Moon
has little money in his pockets
and even less hope in his heart.
He glows in dark, tin can alleys
and casts shadows of stray cats
meowing, clawing, and fucking
in the bruised underbelly of night.
The Moon staggers forever.
His world is a litter of empty
wine bottles he licks with
the light of his tongue.
Tonight the Moon can see
with glassy alcohol eyes
the somber songs he has sung,
that cling and sparkle radiantly
around him like so many stars.
And, at last, the pain he had once
considered so insufferable
has waned, over mountains,
cold deserts, and the black
lustrous oceans that thrash
their hate at rocky coasts.
The Moon rests easy and
pulls a blanket of waves
over his face for comfort
and sleep, only to dream
of whiskey sours,
a girl in his bed.
Richard John Thompson (Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation) lives in Prior Lake, MN and attends Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas. He started there as a liberal arts major but plans to switch his major to creative writing soon.
 Georgenia Earring-Chosa |
Loss of a Language—Forgotten Through Time
By Georgenia Earring-Chosa
When I was young, the kids in school asked me questions like why my parents were old and why they spoke another language. I never really answered their questions; I just let them tease me. I was proud of my Ina (mother) and Ate (father). My parents were always there for me, and they never quit speaking Lakota. Lakota was my first language until I went to school. Once I started school, I was told I needed intense speech classes along with more English. While my classmates were having fun in class, I was kept apart from them and put through many hours of writing and speech therapy, along with Special Ed classes, as the other kids called them. Because I didn’t speak English like everyone else, I was considered to be learning disabled.
Now that I am older, I remember the beauty of my first language. All my relatives, who have since passed away, spoke Lakota like most people speak English. They laughed a lot; they had fun speaking with one another, and it was enjoyable to hear them speak. Hearing Lakota makes me recall stories that have been passed down through generations, teachings and examples of how to live and be well with one another and all living beings. In the Lakota language, there are no words that have a foul use like there are in English. We never cussed at one another. My elders were always kind, as well as giving, be it with words, some kind of handmade craft, or food. Once you entered our home, my Ate’s belief was, what is mine is yours. He always gave something to someone in one way or another.
A man once came to our door and told my Ate that he was too poor to buy clothes for his daughter, who was the same age I was. My Ate told him to come back in an hour. We had gone shopping for school clothes a couple of days before, and my Ate had my Ina take half of what I had to give to the family who was in need. From then on I knew what materialism was and how not to be materialistic. This was just another lesson learned in life.
I learned from my parents to appreciate everything that comes my way. I have one regret; I wish I was more of a fighter. If I was, back in school I would have held on to my language longer. I would have kept practicing it if I had known it would be lost through time. My original Lakota language has been forgotten. Today’s generation use short-cuts when speaking; they don’t speak it fluently. The language isn’t as fun as it used to be when people gathered to speak.
After my Ate had passed on, my Ina moved our family to Denver, Colorado. The city was so big, with so many people of so many colors in every direction. It didn’t matter where we were in that city, we always met someone new. Whenever we came upon other Natives, my Ina would ask in Lakota if they spoke her language. They would look at her not understanding, until one day this lady answered her in Lakota. They talked for hours on end, laughing and laughing. I realized then that my Ina was lonely not speaking her Native tongue.
I think about that a lot. I realize that the Lakota language is becoming lost. I do know bits and parts of words and sentences to get me by when I go home to attend family gatherings. When I am home, I listen to my family speak Lakota to one another, remembering other family members. I listen to them joke with one another, gently tease each other, and laugh together.
Now that I am older and able to join in, I feel the loss of my language, the loss of knowledge I could have passed down to my two children. I feel their loss, even though they don’t know it yet. It is great now that I am older and able to teach my children lessons I learned from my parents; however, it is sad that they go to school and learn the ways of common society. These ways do not teach them their own language and origins. If I was to change something in my life, it would be to speak my own language. School should not have had the chance to change me in that way. Yet the past is the past, and all I can do is learn from it and teach my boys better from it.
Georgenia Earring-Chosa (Cheyenne River Sioux) is enrolled as a full-time student at the Keweenaw Bay Ojibwa Community College (KBOCC) in Baraga, MI. She is an environmental science major, and for the past two years, she has worked as a wildland firefighter. She says, "This is how I discovered I would like to work in the environmental field.”
Earring-Chosa says, " I have always had an interest in writing, but it wasn’t until I attended my composition classes at KBOCC that I developed better writing habits with the help of Penny Olson. She has taught me a lot about grammar, and without her I wouldn’t be the writer I am now.”
|
Leaves in October
By Gerri L. Williams
1.
I was born into light at sunrise; the hollow between a seashell, keye, a ghost-like reflection washing my body with cedar boughs from Green and White Rivers; soil from Black River upon my feet.
Her voice pressed into my fingerprints – white woven blanket against my skin. Abalone buttons and clamshells sewn into grandfather’s story around me: Arthur C. Williams.
Mother, watching J.P. Patches, the local TV clown show, was a woman who comes from Muckleshoot and Puyallup waters, a woman of sockeye People and white candle prayers.
My father, a collection of onyx underneath cattails along Puyallup River, born from Umatilla beaded stories and smoke from salmon flesh.
He is the white of my woven blanket, not the fabric against my skin – the white of my seashell, the forest green of abalone - my first breath in October.
2.
Leaves glazed with pumpkin and cinnamon drifted along White River, stumbled between sandstones, coasted like the ghost of a Muckleshoot girl who once lived along those banks, drifted like si ? sXeb on old Muckleshoot highways.
They tumbled underneath the sun into a den where a wolf child was born with red clay upon his cheeks. As crow sang from Redwood, as Chinook returned upstream, as leaves fell before stiqayu?, together, we opened our eyes.
Author’s Note: Keye means Grandmother. si ? sXeb is the name of my canoe song which came to me on the water in the summer of 2005. It means when an adult lightly pounds a hand drum a child will get up and dance. stiqayu? means wolf.
Gerri L. Williams (Muckleshoot, Yakama, Umatilla and Puyallup) is the daughter of Marlene R. Cross and Claude L. Williams, Sr. She is majoring in creative writing at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Williams sings with the Muckleshoot Canoe Family and with her extended Tribal Journey’s family.
Williams enjoys spending time with her elders and learning from them. She says, "I love listening to their stories. I love listening to them speak in our language. I am always honored to be in their presence.” She acknowledges her elders: Lorraine Cross, Virginia Cross, Norma Rodriguez, Donna Starr, Zalmai Zahir, Les Nelson, and the floor speakers at Tribal Journeys.
Williams says, "I raise my hands up to my instructors and mentors, Jon Davis, Evelina Zuni, Arthur Sze, and Ann Filemyr who have always been supportive of me and my writing. It is with their guidance and support that I am fulfilling my dreams and aspirations of becoming a writer.” After obtaining her BFA degree, she plans to continue on to graduate school.
|
The Savage Heart
By Patrick Austin Freeland
A golden eagle flies high among the clouds, zephyrs of desire beneath his wings. He flies south, away from life among the forests and mountains. He watches silver-surfaced lakes and trickling tributaries coalesce to become a majestic river. Pines and oaks turn into thick brush and glades. His sharp eyes gaze across sights marvelous and new. He drifts lower into the river valley, shapes of unfamiliar creatures, river-dwellers, capturing his attention. Consumed by curiosity, he sinks lower until he can almost touch the surface of the river and so be a part of it.
The eagle stops to rest in the arms of an old tree whitened with age. The eagle speaks with the cautious raccoons and industrious beavers among the trees, listening to their stories and gossip. The turtles listen to the eagle, however, only to fall asleep in the sun. The cicadas sing with the eagle, however show no interest in conversation. The eagle carries on talking with trees farther along the river. He rarely tells stories of his own. The others’ exciting tales of adventure are so unlike his accounts of the cold and lonely mountain slopes and their empty promises.
Eventually, on his journey along the river, the eagle finds himself lost. He’d flown south for so long he had forgotten that there was a north. He’d listened to so many stories and sung so many songs that he couldn’t remember his own. He couldn’t remember the tall pines and snow-covered peaks. He had come to know only the thick grasses and swaying willows. He would fly down above the river to see his reflection, only to remember that he was unlike any of the others around him. Lonely thoughts of dropping into the river to cool his worries weigh down his flight. He perches along the riverbank, trying to remember his past while patiently waiting for the sun: the only thing familiar. As dawn breaks, he flies on into thick fog across the great river.
"Hey there!” a female voice sweetly calls out.
"Hello!” replies the eagle, uplifted as the voice lingers in his ears.
"Where are you going?” she playfully responds.
"I…” stammers the befuddled eagle, "I don’t really know.” He feels foolish, and lands along the rocks of the water’s edge. He pauses a moment, looks across the river, and inquires aloud, "Where are you going?”
"HmmHmhm,” she giggles girlishly, "I’m not going anywhere. I’m just staying right here.”
The eagle peers painfully into the fog. He hops branch to branch over the river, calling out, "I can’t see you!”
The voice gently responds, "It’s okay. I see you.”
The eagle searches desperately, but as sharp as his eyes are, he sees no one along the banks and sandbars, either swimming beneath the surface or in flight above the mighty river. The eagle rests on the soaked skeleton of a pine that has made its way downriver. He calls out, "I don’t know where you are, but I am still here.”
The eagle and the voice speak throughout the foggy morning and misty midday. The eagle smiles in anticipation of finding someone who truly listens to him. As nighttime falls, the haze lifts and the stars come out. The moon washes its great glow all along the river, and the eagle notices a form shaping a curvy swath across the surface of the great river. What he had previously thought was another old tree, he realizes is the source of the voice, a majestic female alligator. He continues to watch her dance across the reflection of the moonlight.
"Is that you?” asks the eagle.
She smiles with bright white teeth gleaming in the lunar pallor and swims nearer.
The eagle observes her features, dangerous, yet oddly sensuous. The rough ridges and peaks of her back remind him of the mountains he had forgotten. Her many glistening teeth, sharp and pointy, remind him of pine needles of the forests, long gone from his memory. The eagle, captivated by this wonderfully strange creature, flies down to the water’s edge to meet her as the purple light of the impending dawn plays prismatically in the murky delta.
"Come closer,” says the alligator seductively. She approaches as the eagle steps into the muck of the river bayou, the tips of his wings touching the muddy water for the first time.
"Closer,” she commands. The eagle obeys.
The waters flow into the ocean, brackish and brown. Distant waves thunder. Foreign winds carry stories from far away. Gulls cry and quibble. A single broad feather floats along the water’s surface, specks of red decorating its shades of tan and white.
Patrick Austin Freeland (Mvskoke) attends Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, KS where he has studied environmental science, liberal arts, and creative writing. Inspired by Haskell teachers Trish Reeves and Theresa Milk, he has "learned new ways of interpreting [his] thought and battling depression through expression.” Freeland says, "I continuously gain a new sense of my own multi-cultural heritage, as I also learn stories of tribes, ethnicities, and cultures from hundreds of other students, each unique and each important.”
Freeland’s interests include: music, public speaking, philosophy, graphic design, advertisement, promotion, fine arts, medicine, policy, language and diplomacy. He is president of the Wetlands Preservation Organization and is also involved in: Future Without Poverty, American Indian Business Leaders, the Indian Leader newspaper, Student Senate, Haskell Voices Committee, Haskell Royalty Committee, A.C.C.E.S. Club, NNN Club, Diné Club, Haskell Ecology Club, Caring Club, and Roe Cloud Dorm Council.
Through a work-study program, he answers phones and arranges campus tours. He writes music and plays piano in a band named Musical Group 4play, along with three fellow Mvskoke Nation members.
Focusing on American Indian Studies, he plans to pursue a political science degree at Harvard, and work for the United States government. Freeland says, "I am who I am today due to the wisdom and constant unwavering support of my great-grandmother, Peggy Sawena King, grandmother, Beulah May Simms, mother, Cecelia Kay Freeland, and father, Brett Freeland.”
|
Maang (Loons)
By Melanie Howick Erickson
Standing on the edge,
she could not tell her tears from the rain.
Her skin stung from a thousand chords
of wind’s song.
She could see now,
once she came closer,
how easy it could be
just to let go,
drop like a jewel
from a silver strand,
tearing the surface of silk momentarily,
floating so gently,
like a lily strand
broken before it bloomed.
Poised near the edge
on fading ripples,
lilies unfurled their grace and beauty.
Surfacing, maang watched,
plumes ruffled by the wind’s song.
Melanie Howick Erickson grew up in England and has twin daughters. She enjoys working with the Boys and Girls Club youth in the Leech Lake area. Erickson takes classes at Leech Lake Tribal College which she says "has a wonderful supportive staff.” She gives a special thank you to Elaine Fleming, her tribal college instructor, "for her help and encouragement.”
Erickson says, "My main interests are history, writing, and art. My poetry is inspired by the natural world, people, and events that touch me on my life’s journey. My poems are an expression of my inner spirit.”
|
Bad Medicine Whistle
By Dave Madden
The powwow was over. The final winners had been called, envelopes stuffed with cash handed out, pictures of the champions taken, hands shaken, and everyone turned to leave. Two fancy dancers walked out of the arena into the moon-lit darkness.
"I had that contest won,” Tommy said as he kicked a clump of grass.
"We both got the gate,” Sonny replied as they trudged to the old Blazer.
They barely noticed the bent figure searching the ground with a lighter.
"We needed a win tonight,” Sonny said.
Tommy didn’t reply. Something shone silver in the moonlight. "What’s this?” He reached down; in his palm was an eagle bone whistle, banded in silver. It looked ancient and magnificent; he put it to his lips.
"Hey, put that back. It could have medicine on it,” Sonny exclaimed.
Tommy looked at the whistle. "No one’ll ever miss it. It’s too cool to leave behind.”
"You have a point, but at least wash it before you put your lips on it."
They strolled to the Blazer and rolled out. When they arrived at Aunt Sara’s, the front door was open. They crashed out as soon as their heads hit the couch pillows.
They awoke to the aroma of bacon, eggs and coffee. Tommy entered the kitchen first.
"Good Morning, Tomas. Is your cousin going to sleep all day?” Sara asked. Just then Sonny staggered into the kitchen. Sara asked the boys about their summer, but she already knew the answers. The powwow world is small and news travels quickly.
"I’ve got something to show you,” Tommy said as he held up the whistle.
"Where’d you get this?” she asked.
"Found it at the powwow,” Tommy said.
"You should have left it,” she replied.
Tommy looked hurt. "Whoever dropped it probably got the gate and left early, like Sonny should have done.” Sonny flipped him the bird.
"Just make sure it’s clean. There’s an old man who takes care of these things. I’ll call him,” Aunt Sara said.
The week sped by. Thursday came and Tommy still hadn’t gone to see the old man. When it was time to go to the powwow, Sara didn’t mention the whistle and neither did Tommy. The drive spanned from jokes to boredom, but once they got to the powwow they were all business.
The grand entry was about to begin, when Sonny noticed Tommy jogging back from the Blazer, the whistle hanging from his wrist. "You’re really going to use that thing?” asked Sonny.
"Hell yah,” Tommy replied.
Sonny shook his head.
Tommy put the whistle to his lips and blew. A shrill sound pierced his ears and he felt a sickening sensation.
Sonny asked, "You okay?”
"I’m all right,” Tommy replied. As he walked out of the arena, he vomited on his moccasins.
"I felt fine until I blew that goddamned whistle…” Tommy threw up again.
"We’re going back to Sara’s.” The drive was long. Tommy tried not to puke on the floorboard, but failed.
When they got to Sara’s, she answered the door half asleep. "What’s wrong?” she asked.
"Tommy’s sick,” Sonny stammered.
She grabbed Tommy and dragged him from the Blazer.
"What’s wrong with you?” she asked.
Tommy said, "I used the whistle and it made me sick.”
"Where is it?” she asked.
Tommy raised his hand, and the whistle spun on its strap.
Aunt Sara turned to Sonny, "Why didn’t you go to a hospital?”
"He wanted to come here, something about an old man."
Aunt Sara looked at Tommy. "Help me get him inside.” Tommy was exhausted, but when he tried to sleep, he awoke heaving. In the morning Sara made a call. Sonny tried to listen, but she spoke in a whisper.
They helped Tommy into the Blazer and drove into the country, down into a creek bottom where a rickety bridge crossed a stream. On the other side was an ancient house. Sonny saw an old man tending a fire.
Sara pulled out two packs of cigarettes. "Give these to the old man.” Sonny helped Tommy walk up to the old man.
"Good morning,” he said as they approached. Cedar smoke wafted through the air.
Sonny shook the old man’s hand and gave over the tobacco. The old man nodded. When Tommy touched the old man’s hand, he felt a shock. The old man staggered and purged his guts. Tommy immediately felt better and could stand on his own.
"Where is this thing you found?” the old man said, regaining his composure. The whistle dangled from Tommy’s wrist. The old man held out his hands, and Tommy dropped the whistle in them. The old man turned and waved the whistle through the smoke, muttering a song.
Sonny watched amazed.
Tommy stared wondering if he’d get the whistle back when they were done.
When the old man finished, he handed the whistle to Tommy. "Take it back. Someone left it as a cruel trick.”
The old man gave Tommy a bitter tea to drink. The sour liquid burned his throat. He convulsed as the brew churned in his guts; when he recovered, a sense of well-being spread throughout his body.
The old man admonished the boys and bid them farewell. As they drove over the bridge, Tommy looked back and waved to the old man.
With Tommy recovered, Sonny itched to get on the road. Sara told them to take the whistle back. They assured her they would, then gave her a hug goodbye.
The field lay empty. Nothing looked the same. Tommy looked at the whistle and threw it into the waving grass, then walked back to the Blazer, and they left the field.
That night when the moon shone bright, a stooped figure shuffled to where the whistle lay. He raised the whistle up, letting the moonlight play off the silver, and then brought the whistle to his lips. A clear note filled the air. The figure pocketed the whistle and stepped off the field.
|
A Whole Person
By Dave Madden
I was eight years old when I became a whole person.
The June In-Lon-Shka dances had arrived and it was my time to go under the arbor and take my place.
I had been to the June dances almost every year of my life, but it was always on the outside looking in at the dancers and drum. Now I would be dressed and allowed to dance.
I remember sitting on a bench under my Aunt Christine’s camp arbor waiting. Wood smoke filled the air. Children ran around in the yard playing. Adults sat around tables conversing and drinking tea or soda. The house was off limits to kids, so who knew what was going on in there. Cars were parked semi-orderly around the yard. Army surplus tents had been erected next to the dining arbor. I could see my Uncle Otto lying on a cot, listening to powwow songs on an old tape player.
When it was time to get dressed, my parents helped my grandfather tie all of the required accouterments onto my small frame. I was dressed in red broadcloth trimmed with ribbon-work, a wide beaded belt, straps of bells, and metal armbands with blue ribbons. A white scarf was placed around my neck, secured by one of my grandmother’s large turquoise and silver rings. A white handkerchief was tied around my head and I was ready. I was the spitting image of an Osage straight dancer, except one thing was missing.
A couple of older men, my older brother Damon and a cousin were dressing that day. Not many for an afternoon session on a Thursday. I sat watching as everyone around me prepared for the coming dance. I felt a little forgotten sitting on my bench, watching the others laugh and joke as they got ready; each wore a porcupine roach with a single eagle feather mounted on his head. I knew this day I would get to wear mine.
A bell rang three times in the course of an hour to call the dancers. Lines of straight dancers streamed out of the surrounding camps and houses, along with the dancers from my aunt’s camp. They walked single file to the dance arbor and stood patiently as they waited to be seated.
I was left alone, sitting on my bench, waiting.
The dance began and I was beginning to get a little nervous. Finally, my grandfather came to me and said it was time. I was given a small, red-tail hawk fan and a folded Pendleton blanket. As we began to walk the short distance to the arbor, my family walked with me. They carried two bundles of cloth with them. When we reached the arbor, we waited. A water break had been called and the dancers and singers were taking a breather. The Town Crier, an old man named Uncle Isaac, stood and walked across the arena and greeted us. I shook his hand and he asked me my name. I told him my name was Dave. He shook his head and asked me for my Osage name. I stammered, and my mother said my name was Do’-Ho-Ho. Uncle Isaac thanked her, and he began loudly speaking Ponca, but the only word I understood was my Osage name.
We stepped into the arbor. I followed my grandfather with my parents behind me and my grandpa’s wife following them. We stopped before the drum keeper of the Wah-Ka-Ko-Li’ committee where the head committee man, Uncle Ed Red Eagle, stood with a mike in his hand.
I was mystified by what I saw around me, benches filled with Osage straight dancers of all ages. I felt like every one of them was staring at me. There was nowhere to hide as I stood looking up at the old man as he began to speak.
He spoke with authority and the confidence of one who knows. He spoke of tradition and who my family was and how they were prominent among the Osage people. He told of my great- grandmother and how she was the only woman ever allowed to have a seat under the arbor. He read from a sheet that my grandfather had given him. On it was written my qualifications and who my family was; he read aloud the names of my father and mother, my grandfather and grandmother, and my brothers. When Uncle Ed had finished reading, he looked down at me and said that I had all of the qualifications to participate but one. My grandfather handed him a small red roach. Uncle Ed tied this onto my head; then he placed an eagle feather onto the spreader, then stood and addressed the assembled dancers once again. Speaking in a solemn tone, he explained the significance of the eagle feather and how it is the most important part of the regalia. He expounded on the connection between the eagle and God. Uncle Ed finished his speech by stressing the importance of religion and having God in our lives and said that by having this eagle feather placed upon my head I was made a whole person.
One at a time he called up the three drum keepers, and we presented each of them with a Pendleton blanket. After that I was walked out to the drum. I carried two cartons of cigarettes and a roll of money. These things I placed on the drum. The Head singer shook my hand and I returned back to where my family stood.
Uncle Ed called for the Whip man. The Whip man came and led me over to the Wah-Ka-Ko-Li’ bench on the east side of the arena. He pointed to an empty space on the bench, and I took my place between two other boys. When the Water boys returned to their seats and the dance continued, I danced those first few songs and felt I was exactly where I was meant to be, dancing alongside my brother, family and friends.
I’m still dancing and hope to never stop.
Larry D. Madden, Jr., a.k.a. “Dave,” (Osage), 34, and his wife, Tara, have three children: Haley, Alexis Rain, and Daniel Sky. Madden says, “They are my greatest inspiration and my greatest supporters.”
In Fall 2009, Madden will be a junior at Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, KS. The liberal arts major and self-professed lifelong avid reader says, “The Haskell professors have aroused in me an interest in writing which I didn’t know was there.” Madden says, “Writing is one of my favorite and most frustrating pastimes.” His future plans are “in the air right now because I am not sure if I want to get a bachelor’s degree in environmental science or try something in the writing field.”
Another of Madden's short stories was also published in last year's Student Edition (TCJ Vol. 20, No.1).