Observation & Gratitude : Wisdom from Wolfkiller

Words from WOLFKILLER - early chapters on Observation & Gratitude.

WOLFKILLER : Wisdom from a Nineteenth-Century Navajo Shepherd - as recorded by Louisa Wade Wetherill, compiled by Harvey Leake : published by GIBBS SMITH - Layton, Utah. 

"the sun / she / is setting...." - EARTH PRAYERS from around the world : 365 Prayers, Poems, and Invocations for Honoring the Earth (HarperSanFrancisco), PEACE ON EARTH (Ballantine).

Readings by Before the Page host Charlie Mehrhoff. 

Transcript

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Before we come to the page, before the first word is ever written down, or read, or listened to, there is a longing to connect. My name is Charlie Merhoff, your host here at Before the Page, a podcast featuring poetry, parable, fiction, and non words to echo our longing. Welcome to episode 38 of Before the Page. Last episode featured part of Louisa Wade Weatherall's introduction to Wolfkiller Wisdom from a nineteenth century Navajo Shepherd. Listeners also heard from the book's opening chapter, The Path of Light. Now you will hear again from Wolfkiller as we continue from the Path of Light with observation and gratitude. Observation. We sat on a sheepskin by the Hogan fire while our mother served us our supper of meat, goat's milk, and cornbread. When the dark had come and the fire was burning brightly, our grandfather arrived to tell us the story he had promised us. Though the wind is blowing very hard tonight, we are warm and should feel thankful for the blessing of having the sheep you were saying you hated. The sheep are safe in the rocks with the dog to guard them through the night. You boys complain about working through the day, but the dog does not complain, although he is always on guard and does not get half the reward you get. You said today that you were doomed to lead a dull life, just going out in the wind, snow, rain, and hot sun to herd sheep. Do you not know that everything about you is interesting if you see things in the right light? Even the burrow you were riding today has a story, and I am going to tell it to you. It was nice and warm in Hogan and all the children and grown people grew silent as grandfather told us this story Creation of the Borough Many, many years ago, when our people lived in the old houses that are now in ruins, the creator made for them deer, coyotes, antelopes, and many other animals. He made them of pearl, agate, jet turquoise, and other things. When he finished making them, he had a pile of scraps of medicines, food, jewels, and other things left over. Having no use for these materials he left them and went to his home. The chief of the villages had a beautiful little sister who liked to play and make things out of clay. She enjoyed exploring the strange corners of the canyon where she lived. One day, while playing, she found the scraps that the creator had made after he had finished making the animals. She ran out to hunt her little brother, calling, Sitsli, my little brother, my little brother, come and see what I have found. Come and let's play with these beautiful things. Let's see what we can make of them. She took her brother to the place where the pile of discards was. Picking up a piece of jet, she said, Let us make some hooves of this. They cut the jet into four small hooves. Then they picked up a handful of the small bits of different things and made a nose. Over this they sprinkled a handful of the ashes of stardust of which the Milky Way was made. That is why your burrow has a grey nose now. The children laughed and laughed. How funny the nose looks all covered with ashes, they said. Next they took a small pile of scraps and molded it into a back, which they sprinkled with ashes and coal. From another pile of scraps they molded a body, and then they made four small legs and attached them all together. To this they added the four small hooves and some stripes of jet around the legs. Now they had a very funny looking animal. He had no ears, so they made him some that looked like those of a jack rabbit. From a cattail that was growing nearby they took some fuzz and pasted it on the body for hair. Then they sprinkled their creation with star dust. He needed a tail, so they made him one out of the material that the creator had made the little black worms of. He has no heart, liver or lungs or intestines, the little girl said. We must make him some. So they cut a heart out of a piece of the stone of which red beads are made. They made him a liver of turquoise and lungs of redstones. They made his intestines of white shell and his tongue of all kinds of scraps. He was finished but could not move, so they put a piece of white shell in for a windpipe. Still he did not move. We only made him for a joke anyway, said the little girl. He was a funny looking animal, and they had a lot of fun over him. Then the wind whispered to them and said He is beautiful inside and is made of strong things. I will put breath into him so he will live, as it is not right to waste beautiful things. So the burrow stood up and was alive. The children went out and gathered pollen from all types of plants, and they fed it to the burrow. Now you won't care what you eat, they said. Then the little girl went out and scooped some water into a white shell. She gave it to the burrow to drink. He began to bray and make a very funny noise because his tongue was made of many different scraps. The children laughed and laughed and jumped up and down, clapping their hands and saying, You are truly a joke. You are not very pretty on the outside with your big head, long ears, and funny tail, the little girl said, but you are beautiful inside, for you are made of beautiful things. Then the wind whispered to them and said You must not say mean things about people if you want them to amount to anything. From now on you must think and talk about this animal in a kindly way. Think of what he is made of inside and not what he looks like on the outside. You know how it depends on what a person is inside as to whether they are worthwhile or not. From now on, try to find the good in people and do not look for the evil. When one looks for the evil in things, they poison themselves as well as the people around them. If you look for the good, you will help yourselves and the people around you. The children took the burrow out to where all the people of the village were working and called them to come and see what they had made. The people gathered around and made fun of him. They also laughed at the children for making such a funny looking animal. This made the little girl angry. If you think he is so ugly, maybe he can run, she said. Bring on your other animals and let's have a race. Just to humor the children and have a little fun, the older people smoothed off a racetrack all around the villages. Then they called in all the other animals and told them what was going to happen. The animals gathered around the little burrow and laughed and made all kinds of fun of him, telling him how bad they were going to beat him in the race, for they said that one so ugly as he was, and so small and so slow looking could not run. The children went over to the burrow and told him that he was to run this race and not to mind what the other animals said, but to do his best. Now this race was to be four times around the villages, and it was a long way from one village to the other. Finally everything was ready, so the animals were called to the line and the race began. The deer, with her long, shapely legs, started away with a bound. Right behind her came the coyote on a long run, and the other animals came rapidly behind them, wanting to get the race over in a hurry so they might laugh more at the funny little burrow who was following along behind at a slow, steady trot. The first time around the track the deer, coyote, and other animals were far ahead. When they came around the second time the little burrow was right up with the horses and mules. On the third lap he passed all the animals except the deer, coyote, and antelope, which he had caught up with. On the final lap the little burrow passed the rest of the animals. They had collapsed alongside the track, tired out. The little burrow came in long before the sun went down and did not seem a bit tired. The next day the rest of the animals came dragging slowly in. The little girl and boy then had the laugh on their parents and the rest of the people for making fun of the animal they had made. When grandfather finished telling a story we had much to think about. We had never paid attention to the burrow, but we decided to look at him more closely the next day. As he left our hogan, grandfather said Tomorrow I want you to look around out there on the flat and see what birds and animals you can see. Tomorrow night I will tell you another story about some of them. They all have their story. We went to our beds of sheepskins and robes. It seemed that we had hardly fallen asleep before our mother called us to get up, saying that another day had come. The dawn was opening the curtains for the sun to come through, and we must take the ashes out from the Hogan before the sun came up. We asked her why we must always get the ashes out so early in the morning. She explained that the ashes must not blow into the sun's eyes, or he could not see his way clearly. Besides, by taking them out while still dark, we could see any glowing coals and take care of them so they would not start a fire around the Hogan. After we took out the ashes and the fire was burning brightly, mother roasted some sheep ribs over the coals, made some bread of cornmeal, and gave us our breakfast. Then she sent us out with the sheep. The sun had not quite risen when we started the sheep out of the corral. The wind was not blowing very hard, but we knew it would come up again with the sun, because it always blows three days at that time of year. We did not worry about the wind, though, as we were thinking of the burrow we were riding. We could hardly wait until we could get the sheep out to feed, so we could have time to look at him more closely. About the time we got the sheep to feeding, the sun came up in a red haze, and the sand was veiling his face. The wind began to blow furiously, but it did not bother us nearly as much as it had the day before. We looked at our burrow, and sure enough his nose and belly were white with the star dust that was left after the Milky Way was made. His hooves were black jet, his legs were striped with bars of jet, his hair did really look like the fuss of the cattail, and his ears were just like a jackrabbit's. We said we wished that we could see his heart, liver, and lungs, how beautiful they must be, all made with jewels. I told my brother that I wished we would have been made of beautiful things, as the burrow was. How nice it must be to be made of beautiful things inside. We were so absorbed in studying the burrow that we did not hear our grandfather when he rode up to us. He got off his horse and came to us just as I said, I wish we could have been made of beautiful things inside. You are made of beautiful things inside, he said. But you can turn all of the beautiful things to ugly, mean things if you do not try to keep them beautiful. If you allow yourselves to become angry and think evil thoughts, it will soon poison you so that you can no longer find the path of light. You will soon be like a tree that has stood in stagnant water until the insides of its roots turn black and soft. From this day on you must try to keep your thoughts on the straight path ahead and not look for evil and feel discontented. Think of the burrow that goes on day after day carrying you so patiently. He does not complain about the work that he has to do. Think of what I told you yesterday, of the times when our people suffered from hunger and cold day after day and year after year. Do not worry about the wind blowing. We cannot help it, and there is some reason for it. You know there is a great spirit over all, who controls everything and what comes to us is his business, not ours. Of course he does not want us to just sit still and not try to make things better. You know that when we pray we always say Now all is peace or now all is well at the end of every prayer, because we must believe that we will receive what we ask for. Keep your thoughts on the beautiful things you see around you. They may not seem beautiful to you at first, but if you look at them carefully you will soon learn that everything has some beauty in it. Just then a desert sparrow flew out of the sagebrush nearby. Do you see that little bird? Grandfather asked. Don't you think he is beautiful? I replied that he was just a little grey bird and not nearly as pretty as a blue bird or an aureole. Grandfather promised to tell us the story of the making of the desert sparrow when the sun had finished his work and we could again sit by the Hogan fire. He said he must now go on with the work he had to do, and we must watch the sheep and get them back to the corral safely. With this he rode away. We went on talking about the burrow and watching the sheep as they fed on the brush and weeds around us. Several sparrows were flying about. We wondered what their story would be and whether we would like it as well as we had liked the story about the burrow. The sparrows still did not seem very pretty to us, but I said we might see them in a different light after hearing grandfather's story. The wind blew hotter and hotter as the day went on, but somehow we did not mind it at all. Now we had other things to think about. Our mother was roasting the meat for our supper and baking the cornbread on a hot stone by the side of the fire. We were very hungry and the food looked so good. We ate just two meals each day, as our people think it is not right to eat too much. I had not thought much about this before and decided to ask Mother why we believed this. My son, she replied, you must be waking up like the earth awakens in the spring. When the first clap of thunder comes to call her from her winter sleep and to tell her it is time to be up and send forth the plants for the food for her children. Have you never seen a snake when he has eaten too much? How helpless he is? He cannot even protect himself. He lies quietly and does not notice anything around him. Now a snake was made that way and must live his life as he was made to live it. But you are different. You were not made to lie dormant until you have digested your food. You would have a hard time hiding away for the time it takes you to digest it. Have you never noticed how sleepy you get if you eat too much? You did not even want to play. So if you are greedy and always eat too much, you cannot live the life you were meant to live. It was good to be in the Hogan, out of the wind. Our home with its pallets of sheepskins and robes and a fire in the center, seemed like a different place to me tonight. I was thinking of what grandfather had told us about the blessings we had that we should be thankful for. Somehow the Hogan looked different, and so did our mother and sister. I thought of what grandfather had said of the beautiful things we were made of inside, and I thought he must have told the same thing to our mother when she was a little girl, as she was always ready to do what she could for everyone. She was never angry or cross, but was always smiling and ready to give us our supper when we came home. I looked at her and noticed how black and shiny her hair looked in the firelight. Our sister took a black pottery jug from the corner and went out to milk the goats so we could have fresh milk for our supper. I looked at the blankets in the loom on which she and mother had been weaving all day, and I really noticed them for the first time. I thought how hard it must be to count the threads of the warp all day and put in each colored thread of the wool so they would make the design come out right. There, by the side of the blanket, were all of the colored balls of yarn that they had washed, carded, dyed, and sewed. Spun. I thought how foolish I had been when I had told my brother the day before that our mother and sister had nothing to do but sit by the Hogan fire, weave blankets, and cook. The cooking must be hard, and the blanket weaving must be even harder. Our sister came in with the goat's milk about the time that father and grandfather arrived. Mother said that our supper was ready, and we all sat down around the fire to eat. Again, before the page would like to express its great gratitude to Harvey Leake for his permission to read the words of Wolfkiller, wisdom from a nineteenth century Navajo Shepherd. If you're curious about how Desert Sparrow was created, if you would like to sit with more of Wolfkiller's wisdom, the book is available from its publisher Gibbs Smith. It can also be had via Amazon or through your local library, hopefully. We will close out this episode of Before the Page with a simple poem found in Earth Prayers from around the world, HarperCollins, as well as in Peace on Earth, Valentine, composed by the reader. The sun she is setting in the tall grass beneath the pines, where the heart beats one with the land, where the mule deer approach their antlers raised, where with palms upturned we pray. Thank you so very much for listening to this episode of Before the Page. If you would like to get in touch with us here before the page, that's easy enough to do. Just go to before the page at gmail.com. It's spelled just how it sounds, before the page at gmail.com. Adios.