Medicines in the Path

Look at the ground you are standing on. Right there. The medicine you need at this moment.
Walk the land. Walk the land you are living on. Right there..........the helper you need at this moment. Tansi, medicine friends...........!!! I raise my tobacco to thank you and I raise my tobacco to speak with you, and to let you speak with me....tell me how to bring you into me so that I may again be whole. Thank you for your voice, medicine sister, medicine brother. Thank you Grandmother, for teaching me how to gather. Thank you Grandfather, for teaching me how to listen. Meegwich.

Light your fires. Light your fires. At the mountaintop, light them. In your hearth, light them.
In your heart, light them. In your cooking stove, light them. The act of the Creator left for us to remember how................how to come through..............how to be...to create....to find our way.
Light your fires and you will find what is lost.

Praying is for Thankin

Grandfather.,

Today I saw a little girl pray for all of the ones who forgot how to pray.
She held her tobacco high into the sky and sang a little girl song and all the birds joined in.
I heard you, Grandfather, voice pitched high with hers making the sound of two together to make the spiral smoke that is our prayer.
Why have they forgotten how to pray, Grandfather, until they are in trouble?

Don't they remember that praying is for thanking?

Wishing is for stars and old ones who want to come home.

Toad Medicine

And so, Grandfather, Ayiki stayed long after they had gone. He blinked at me when the sunlight broke through and the blankets were gone from Nokomis. He cleansed and stayed to cleanse again and no one noticed. Why have they forgotten, Grandfather? They talk about saving Mother Earth and they do not know her very children. Ayiki tells me of a time when man could speak Ayiki words and in those days the world could clean itself. Tell me Grandfather, how can I remind them?

Apistay Moosa gave life, Grandfather. She bore her small one in the early morning and left the new one to find its legs while she filled her belly to fill her teats. In the moments of her goneness, there was the fear and the tears and the humaness of imagining that no one would return.
How can I remind them, Grandfather, that from birth the four-legged teach their young abandonment so that they can know the voices of all beingness? I ask them to listen hard, but they cannot hear me.

I can bearly hear myself.

Do not forget us, Grandfather.
Keechay Manitiou, Kataa petchea kea. Kanee wapameconan kape mate sey ya.

Leaves and The Moon

Grandmother, the plants came alive fast this year. The trees are thick with leaves, and the leaves are thin and soft. It all came so fast this year. What does that mean Grandmother?
Why are some years slow and some years fast?

Granddaughter, that is just the way. Listen to that and watch the young men and women. Listen to that and know the way of it all. Our brothers and sisters the plants tell us about ourselves in a way that we cannot otherwise know. There are signs and they are clear.
I often think when I sit in my lodge that the people have forgotten this, but it is right there for all to see.

Grandmother, today I think I will open my eyes. Today the sun is shining so brightly, how can I miss the signs?

Granddaughter, you can only miss them if you are looking too hard at the sun. The daze of days.
Look at the moon and she will talk to you.

Granddaughter

On the day that Granddaughter was born, there was warm in the air and bud was bursting into leaf. All manner of birdsong filled the trees, dancing here and there, and our daughter, the daughter of humankind came forward from a sacred womb and her cry filled the Eastern door with promise. Welcome, Granddaughter. Grandmother and Grandfather are dancing just beyond the place where you will someday be.

Grandmother Shines

Grandmother. You are full tonight and I can see in the hidden places of my own heart. Tonight the Oldest of the Tribes celebrate survival. I celebrate with them, inside of my heart and bask in your light. Tonight I will dream of Grandfather and he will teach me what I need to know.
Thank you Grandmother. For Lighting the way.

The Eastern Door

Hello Grandfather, I hearing you singing in the mornings since the New Moon of
Mikisowipisim. Strong and hard your voice calls and reminds me of my youth and I look out for the young lovers all over the world. Hope in continuance, Grandfather, the Sacred Circle of Life as danced by the people. Makopeywesis calls for the Shaking Seeds and life dances up toward the sky. Maybe the Old Women will dance this Spring, Grandfather. Maybe we will dance for the ones who left us in the Snows, maybe we will dance for the ones who stayed. Maybe we will dance for the coming of our Grandchildren. Maybe we will dance for the Grandfathers who sit and smoke and talk of times gone by and Snows and Springs of Long Ago.

Grandfather I miss you, but I hear your voice and see your face in all the faces of the young and old. I see your tears on the tips of melting icicles and feel your warmth in the late Winter Sun. Aho! Grandfather! Walk with me and we will bring in Spring together!

Finding High Ground

There is no place to cross the river, here. Waters rushing fast and pulling everything along with it. This is the way it is after heavy rain or thaw. No place to cross the river.

No where to skirt the fire, here. All around the flames lick old cedars, catching the oils of the tree so that the hot charged flicks of flare jump up and consume fast and faster. No where to skirt the fire.

No shelter from the wind, here. Across the high desert and relentless whistling here. No crossing it now its formless piercing flow. No one can see where the force pushes from, but..............no shelter from the wind.

Sometimes, if we wait, the water slows. Sometimes, if we wait, the fire ebbs. Sometimes, if we wait, the wind dies. And, sometimes, we take another way.

Grandfather, I will take another way.