Urban Nizhóní

Part One: Those Who Thunder (pp. 24-26)

2012-02-01T08:39:00.000-08:00

That was her first change of heart. Papillon. She made it not without a tremendous strain to what was left. Her ruptured appendix had gone untreated for two weeks. She'd gone septic. Her insides twisted as violently as her body, bowels removed, replaced, removed, replaced, removed, and replaced. She was sewn up for the third time, for good. If she could quit drinking she could eat a rat. Her options were slim but still extended farther than she thought they would. She had to be thin, the plastic torso installed required that much of her. Sometimes she was able to trap a hand full of birds for songbird soup. She was developing a taste for the things she knew best in that place where memory fails to make a conscious show of itself. Hawk. García Márquez. If it was good enough for them she knew it would be good for her.

She was starving.

She kept the feathers for trade. A possible bag, she was having one made by NIKIL. The scalped man came and left bundles for her. He fed them both, four nights a week. Shimá saní teaching her to stretch what he brought. The rest she culled from the small garden she kept in pots along the pavement. Her back door opened up to a five by five square of concrete and she'd found a seed bag left in the corner, one morning while she was walking in circles.

He reminded her of her uncle Alvin. He lost his life to a street sweeper, passed out on the streets of Longmont Colorado. The driver said he couldn't see him. They had that problem, no one could ever see them. She saw him, between the cracks of the Chinese language newspapers that lined her windows. His arm severed at the elbow, his scalp peeled back behind his ears and his left eye blacked to the cheek. He wore work pants and a button down shirt. His feet flat and naked against the pavement. Across his shoulder he wore a beaded knife sheath she had given him. The possible bag, for the tobacco gifts she gave when he brought fresh supplies and meat, still in process.

He wasn't allowed a return. Those scalped in battle were, according to their ways, Sahnish people, transformed spirits. They were required to shun humans and human contact. They lived on their own. tshunúxu' lived in the park, off Lincoln, at the outskirts of a populated area. With its pockets that opened and closed. You could find yourself inside one, then hidden from view. Then with one step you were outside, again, beneath the sky on the Chain of Lakes. The bison paddock was just remodeled. The horse stables are in disrepair. She wanders the paths as they are laid out, her footing lacking a muscular structure.

They met there in the thick morning fog and he took her into the trunk of a tree. His lodge was round, in the corner a beautifully tanned buffalo hide. He lit a fire and it was warm. He cooked them meat; she ate what she was served. It was vast, his home, in the center of the tree. Age had hollowed the frame. They sat inside, together. He talked. He needed tobacco. Colored men, they did this to her, recognized her on the streets, especially at night, especially when they were drunk. Winos and black men knew her best. She figured it was her grandfather. He kept nearby. It was his seed bag she'd found. She knew it was him helping her maintain the small pots of soil that yielded her sage, coneflower and lemon. They could see him, or they could just see her. It was more than many were willing to do. Recognize she was one.

From that day on he'd brought her meat, good meat: dried elk, mutton, fresh buffalo and jerky. She fed herself and she fed NIKIL. Together K'é, it is the law. She lives by it. She asked him to watch over NIKIL. She is going on the warpath. She is going. Shich'oni. naawiinakuúnu'. She goes. He watches over, ensuring that nothing is difficult for her. She defaces the city, sign after sign, and no one catches her. She marks the space with their words. The men, Son of Star promised, she is one. He gives her time to leave her messages. He gives her hawk feathers for silence. He gives her a fast pass for the Owl. He had a name, this one, tshunúxu', he told it to Papillon. She keeps it there, to herself. Bi'choni, she doesn't tell her. On the war path. she goes. tiraa'iitUxtaáNIˆs. It is true. This war. This story I tell.

wetAhneesí'it. Now I am letting go of the gut.

Part One: Those Who Thunder (pp. 20-23)

2012-01-27T06:48:00.000-08:00

noowiwituuniíwat. Then he told about himself. Using the alphabet they established on the Fort Berthold Reservation for language instruction. 1975. paatúh kananuuninó, Not Afraid of the Enemy. Telling about it, this way, what the reason is. I am telling.

Creating a fluent speaker. Our problems are our tools. Use them to get what you want: a new fluent speaker. One person who can communicate from their soul, the things they feel, she said, Mrs. Nancy Richardson Steele. This is her definition of fluent. Make yourself understood leaving English behind you. Behind you, leave it. Focus on learning. You understand first. If you have living speakers, create your own immersion. Doing. Speaking. Listening. If you don't want to starve you will learn how to ask. What's for food? I am hungry. One to one, living your daily life, together in language. Immersion. Leaving English behind. For today, leave it.

This is a process.

Traditional activities lead to language, especially things with a sequence.

Miss Navajo Nation, the girls check in. They sleep. Day one begins: Traditional Skills Competition, Butchering. They meet at a circle of ground under the awning in the Hazzel Yazzie Pavilion at the Fair Grounds in Window Rock. The women are dressed. They dress themselves: tl’aakal, deiji’éé’ dishooígíí, ké nitsaaí, and sis lichí’í for good posture. The wear an apron to cover their dress and plastic coverings over their moccasins. They tie their hair and are recognized by each other, and by the gods.

In teams of two they work. Together, strength is required. Hold the dibé. One girl has the sheep hugged tight to her breast. She keeps it still, as well as she can. The other takes a sharp bladed knife and slits the throat, quickly, with accuracy and care. Death is intimate. Together they act: two girls, one dibé. They pour the blood into a bowl. Their speech at a barely audible volume. One severs the head clean from the body. The animal bleeds out. Sheep is life. They lift it and tie its hind quarters with rope. The body hangs in the arena and they butcher, first this sheep, then another.

Two girls form one team, one sheep per team. Their voices a barely inaudible hush. Their bodies moving as one, two heads, four hands. They lift the second dibé by its rear and tie it to the post. It finally bleeds out. One cuts at the base of skin while the other pulls, exposing the muscle of meat. Then she, the one with the knife starts to disembowel the dibé. One slice long down the body, two hands reach in. Intestines, they will use them, later for ach'ii, they must be cleaned. What one cuts clean the other removes. Each piece piled neat, grace is required of the human soul. Sheep is life. They give it to us. They work until they are done. They each select the pieces they've chosen to prepare.

Each part they know. It's their responsibility to know, for a feast of return, for a traveling child, for a puberty ceremony or for a soldier going to war. Sheep are life, they give it to us. We kill our own. There are many reasons. Today, there is one, demonstrating the abilities that carry us on, uniquely as who we are. Each death has meaning. The manner of killing shapes the soul.

Fire must be made. Even now, at this time. They face their pit and set their fuel to flame. They prepare their bowls with flour, fat, salt and water. Proportions—they are on their own with only their practice for company. The two who work together so well each make a good fire. Their tortillas are different. One has a bowl of sticky dough she is adding flour to. Eventually she has a slightly dry ball. She pulls small lumps off and shapes them one by one, pushing and pulling them into shape. Sometimes poking a hole, then patching it up. Before placing it on the hot grate. Turning a few times before moving them to a plate.

The other girl barely handles her dough. Proportions—from years of helping at home. Second nature to her, she stands and slaps the balls from her left palm to her right. She knows where everything is: meat nearly done. One flip per tortilla. The pile quietly grows and off to the side the other two contestants struggle along, still butchering their sheep. It should go fast. Death an intimacy that requires the strength to maintain your momentum.

The girl on the left is looking ill. She is shaken from the heat, the pressure, the blood pouring out. Balance, she has lost it. The people step in and move her aside. Rest, water, comfort she needs. The medical team will check her over. She was trembling to faint, they caught her first, before hitting ground. Her partner must go on alone. She struggles to lift the back of the lamb, so she can continue her task. A woman must move into the space that opens itself up. She reaches inside and finds what she needs, a woman, there is one. Things need to be done. The animal hangs. She must respect what it has given. She skins alone. She cuts alone and finally she makes it to her place and prepares her pit. Fire. Flour. Salt. Water. Fat. She is tired and the tortillas shape themselves. What effort she gives something unseen gives back and the judges taste her food last. It does not taste best, and it does not taste bad.

She shows the signs of a good day's work. They all do. Clothes dusted, their hair sticking out. The meal they share they prepared themselves. Water. They drink it. The judges make notes. They keep to themselves.

cpc©NIKIL

On the third day they share their talents. Most of them sing in Navajo, even if they cannot speak. They memorize their clans but can't answer questions. Sing, they can sing. Words are birds flying out of Bat Woman's basket, scattering in directions too numerous to track. Taking on their own life, their own character and appearance. The number of speakers, fluent and not, scatters too.

wetatuhneesuuníkUt. I have caught the gut.

Part One: Those Who Thunder (pp. 14-20)

2012-01-24T09:28:00.000-08:00

The white man kept a journal.

Language has power to transform the soul. Language. We are speaking. Knives. Sharp Rocks. To the Dwelling School they want us to go. Exchanging our knowledge for sign and symbol. Big Norman's school for delinquents runs out of the back of his Honda Civic. Knives— he distributes them to his students.

"Don't shit your pants. Learn how to use it."

They laugh but he's not kidding. One of his hands can wrap around their head. His eyes small as hawk's, his nose as big. His legs long thin muscles—they support him.

You don't sign up. You are chosen.

Get in touch with your dark side on the 26 Valencia. Food. They sell it at the store. Whole Foods and Rainbow. Dimitri, the Greek, runs Noriega Produce out near the ocean. Everyone needs their people. Practical choices, you make them. Miss Navajo Nation must butcher a sheep and then she must cook it. Take your knife. Develop some skills. Language is life. The Headlands. Armed resistance is tongue tied. You can take the bus or walk. The feet work when you use them.

L. Frank, the dandy, will likely be there. 'anó' is never no missing person. Sunrise gathering. Everyone makes their own, prayers to their creator. Tolowa. Yurok. Hilula. Karuk. Shasta. Modoc. Wiyot. Hupa. Wintu. Achomawi. Northern Paiute. Chimariko. Wintu. Atsugewi. Mattole. Nongati. Yana. Maidu. Lassik. Wailaki. Nomlaki. Sinkiyone. Kato. Coast Yuki. Huchnom. Konkow. Pomo. Patwin. Nisenan. Washo. Lake Miwok. Wappo. Coast Miwok. Mono Lake Northern Paiute. Sierra Miwok. Ohlone. Northern Valley Yokuts. Owens Valley Paiute Shoshone. Esselen. Saianan. Southern Valley Yokuts. Foothill Yokuts. Monache. Tabtulabal. Kawaiisu. Southern Paiutes. Chumash. Kitanemuk. Serrano. Tataviam. Chemehuevi. Mojave. Halchidhoma. Quechan. Tipai. Ipai. Gabrieleño. Luiseño. Lakota, Tslagi and Diné.

We gather at the food hall for eggs, fruit and Alvarado Street Baking. The Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival, 8th annual conference, second morning.

Point of fact: they sleep on wood slat platforms, a mattress of wadded cotton beneath them. This gathering is of their creation. We eat. We walk to the Sunset Room. The bay forms a small lagoon where fresh water collects, running down from Mount Tamalpais. We sit on chairs laid out in lines. Beautiful women, some with flowers in their hair and beautiful men, all ages. Introductions are made. 2008. They have their linguist, Leanne Hinton. L. Frank walks with two feet, both of them are broken.

She wears her face, where ever she goes, she wears it. Standing between two aluminum crutches, her Calvary jacket on, she wears it.

Blessings and introductions. 9AM. Board of Directors and one linguist. Ten minutes each, count them. Leanne Hinton is given the lead, "Language Revitalization must begin at home, because that's where language ended. That's where it's got to begin." She passes the mike over to L. who rests her arms on the tops of her crutches, her legs two reeds below her.

"I'm Tongva and Ajachmem." Pause. "When I tell people that they look at me like, 'What?' so I say, 'I'm a Hollywood Indian.' My Grandpa used to play a white cowboy."

We laugh.

"My tribes are extinct."

We laugh again.

"My family told me to get in the closet and don't ever come out." Pause. Obviously she didn't.

"What affected me most were the places I played. I'd hear things. At the bottom of Mount Loyola Marymount. It has a big L that lit up at night." She jumps like she was falling downstairs in a dream, "Oh, I'm at the house o the lord." She says looking up in the sky, arms raised at the bends. Her face unadulterated amazement.

We laugh, together, with one mouth, we are laughing.

"Ravens would teach me things, but I wasn't very bright." She is looking at each of us and at no one. Just beyond our bodies into our souls, she is looking.

"I search things out that made sense to me. I knew who I was early on."

Time is passing like it does, differently when she is speaking. A river of words, a watch a dam. Everyone, they are listening.

"Do I have 20 minutes? The Lakota guy did."

Everyone is laughing.

The Lakota guy squirms. California Indians sit around us. We're in a room and they are sitting around. Home. We have found it. They make it easy to stay. Listen, her introduction, she is still giving.

"I was learning to weave. We were living across the street from Disneyland. I could see the Tea Cups from where I was sitting." She raises her hands up at the elbow joints and leaks a slow sound out of the balloon of her belly—aaaaAAAAAaaaaaaaAAAAAAaaaaaaa. "An old guy was teaching me and he told me I had to do it naked."

Everyone laughs and she maintains the deadpan of her persona.

"I would start my basket and start hearing voices, 'Oh, someone's coming" and I jumped up and put on my clothes and run out front. 'Who's here?' My brother would say 'what?' Looking confused. 'No one. There's no one.' So I'd go back and take my clothes off and start weaving. I heard them again. The voices. 'Oh. Someone's coming.' I put my clothes on and ran back out. My brother looked at me again. 'I heard voices.' 'No.' He said. 'Nobody.' I went back—to the cement square— and started weaving. This time when I heard the voices I kept weaving. It was the basket. So I stayed. I was so intrigued. I had to know what they were saying. I went and asked; I need someone to teach me my language. They said, 'good luck. Your people are extinct.'"

Every one sat. Silence standing among us. We allowed it, each one.

"It was a long journey me, myself and I'd like to make that journey shorter for everyone else."

In the silence—the moment between then and now—in that moment they met, L. Frank Manriquez and Nancy Richardson Steele. They had a gathering to access the language in California. Dire. In response they decided to form an organization. In the silence we sit. Some of the women wear flowers in their hair. Their bodies heavy on the folding chairs. Dan Golding stands at the back. His son running between him and his beautiful wife Mercedes. The rest of the board introduces themselves.

Nancy Richardson Steele, Karuk, returns to speak. Thanking the ancestors and the people because we're all here to learn language. She and her husband brought presents for the board. To each one they are given.

L. Frank Manriquez.

She hangs there between her crutches, an eagle feather she is receiving.

Nancy speaks.

Leanne speaks, "L. is the initiator of Breath of Life."

Carol Lewis remembers, "L. was telling a story about learning a language where there are no speakers. After lots of work she finally found a recording. She got the tape and carried it carefully around. Waiting till she was ready, for the first time, to hear words spoken. She put in the tape and pressed play. Nothing. How she cried. Something was wrong. Grief. She thought she would, then at the moment, for the very first time hear it." She paused and we all sat without our knowledge of L. and of our own language. "Every time I want to get lazy I think of L. Frank. I wish you the best and I want to recognize you." She turns and embraces her.

Breath of Life: Revitalizing Languages Without Speakers begins at 10:15. We walk, each one, to the place they’ve chosen. Decisions, we make them. We gather, in the rectangle room. Someone wheels L. Frank up in a clunky chair, her feet resting on the metal stays. She looks ready for discharge at county. She manages to stand, then shuffles to the table and sits. Everyone continues to file in around her.

There are few. With four workshops at this time, you choose one. We, a few, have chosen this: Breath of Life, AICLS program for learners with no living speakers. Two women sit next to L. at the table, they begin speaking.

"This is for us invisibles." L. Says. "You're given a linguist, well, not yours to keep. When you get to UCB you're given cryptic field notes. You know what you want: to pray, to sing, to live with your children, to get through the land of the dead. Then you come up with your project."

She starts like this, somewhere in the middle and we follow. Quirina Luna and Deb Murillo sit by her side. She asks them to make their introductions.

A young woman with a newborn rises and introduces herself in her own language: Quirina Luna.

"My language was dormant for 70 years. . . it was intimidating going to Cal. The first year we translated old stories. The workshops really gave us boosts. We developed different materials because we had no dictionary. Decisions had to be made. We decided to design our own orthography. We made new words for things that didn't exist, like far talker for phone. We went back to basics. What's important: learning, immersion and studying and teaching children. It takes a conscious effort to learn. The only way is to use it. Use it in your every day life."

She sits. The baby makes sounds to the voice of her mother. The second woman stands. Deb Murillo. She tells us, because of the land her grandma spoke three languages, but she, she just had words and pieces of words. Her grandpa said, "You gotta know how to pray in your language,” so the first year of Breath of Life she did prayer. She had failures. Her computer broke and she lost everything.

"Keep it simple. Your life, everything."

She posts cards up around her house in language.

"Read your signs. In order to speak you have to hear it." She pauses. "Practice. Do whatever you can with the language." She does. "Three hours at night, I devote to language. This year my goal is to know all the names of all the living beings, because when you pray that's the next step."

L. Frank leans on the table like she's going to dig into a bowl of acorn mush.

"Put your language everywhere. Make your immersion. It's a lot of work, but such a joy that you wouldn't change. Try to create a community, especially when you're working alone. See that language is not a stodgy thing. It has all the emotions you do. Take that education and use all that we have."

She tells a story about a drawing she made of Coyote in a dress with a rolling pin raised over his head. "It's about inflicted cultural transvestism. We are wearing someone's culture. Why not take it off? Our ancestors used to be naked, why not us."

She sings a song about when Coyote was a beautiful piece of driftwood floating downstream.

Coyote, his cry.

Sage, it’s breath.

Memory, memory, it’s desires.

I am not Coyote, I am not Coyote.

I am a beautiful piece of driftwood.

"If laughter is not coming something is wrong."

She says, "put downs come from fear. We don't want people to be afraid. Language will straighten this out. It's time to take a look at ourselves. I say to the grantors, 'you want to feed us and house us. It's in our language. We can live on beans and rice. We can live 20 to a house. What we need is language."

We sit. We listen. She talks.

"The mandate is to go out and tell people the world has changed."

Part One: Those Who Thunder (pp. 9-14)

2012-01-20T06:36:00.000-08:00

Cholera. Small Pox. Free Market Economy.

Drugs. Alcohol. Diabetes.

My name is NIKIL and I approved this message.

Every birth has meaning.

He drew himself, Four Bears, the Mandan, slaying a Cheyenne. His face painted vermillion from ear to ear, under the nose to the bottom of his chin, wearing 16 eagle feathers, each one with red hair fastened to the end; blue dots painted on their white centers. His headdress red, his hair plaited, beads strung on the end.

His arms a deep vermillion to match. His face and his chest dashed red north to south. His right leg blackened with 23 stripes, edged with the most delicately beautiful black and red fringe. His left leg lined with 24 red stripes, the sides striped with thick black lines, four, and edged with the same red and black fringe of the other. His feet striped red. Attached round the ankles a red and black cloth cut into a diamond.

Mato Tope, Four Bears, the Mandan, his axe in his right hand, is being stabbed with a broad blade knife in his left. It looks like he is grabbing through the wound.

Across from him in an open fighting stance, Four Bear's left foot to the Cheyenne's right stands the chief holding a red trade cloth satchel and a white powder horn, its tip painted black.

From the waist up he is smoked black, his skin showing through the pigment. His face the blue black of the northern plains, near the place the Blackfeet call the Backbone of the Earth. His right leg painted yellow and dotted blue black, 20 circles above the knee, 5 hollow dots just along the outline of his quadricep, 10 solid blue black dots down to his foot. His left foot painted brown and black like brindled fur. Both knees banded with a red and black striped cuff. Down the side of each leg are 18 triangles, their bases face out, their points touch flesh. These form the fringe. Four eagle feathers jut out, two from each knee, red string tied to them. His feet painted red. His head wrapped in fur; his hair adorned with feathers.

Four Bears, the Mandan, his eyes small dots surrounded by a large circle. His focus in the space that can only be reached by a personal journey.

He gave this to them, the men, Maximilian, Bodmer, riding the steamer up the great Missouri. In 1833 he left them this, his record.

Wah ©NIKIL

He posed for Maximilian and Bodmer. Now he poses for her. The men, Son Of Star, promised in case of war. She is one. Killing. Stealing Horses. Her name, it is new, her hands, each one old. Her Grandmother, she flows through them. War. There is one. Wah. Now. Populations increase and so do they. Dogs. His face more beautiful than broken.

Four Bears, the Mandan, dressed for war. She painted him once, because he asked, Sahnish he was fluent.

His hands are unadorned, with no jewels and no iron. Around his neck a very simple choker made of a single strap of sinew wrapping a small bundle of stone root. His face yellow from forehead to brow; his eyes circled, one red, the other yellow. His chin yellow too, the rest of his face streaked red.

In his hair his wounds were marked. She was certain to retain the details: four yellow sticks, one blue and one red, each with a nail head, painted yellow, driven down the center, signifying his wounds from bullets. At his ear, on the right side of his head he'd fastened a wooden knife that was painted solid red. The Cheyenne chief of his own recent drawing, he killed him and it was known by the knife, as he wore it. At the back of his head he wore a large tuft of owl feathers, died yellow, indicating his membership in the Dog Band. He also wore an eagle feather with a yellow horse hair fastened to the end and a turkey feather with a small triangle snipped neatly from its side, the edge lined with red and another turkey feather split directly down the center to show an arrow wound; he survived it.

In his hands, unadorned, was his thin shafted axe. The handle wrapped in red, the central grasping place wrapped in red, flanked by blue and white striped beadwork. A simple red hand-width of handle before the blade, shaped nearly into a perfect triangle.

His topknot tied with red cloth to form a short fountain. The remainder of his hair long down his back, the sides of which were cut short at the ears.

The parts left were his own flesh which spoke in detail of his unmitigated strength and power in battle. His coups were marked with paint. From shoulder to waist and down both arms he was streaked a reddish brown. His coups marked by horizontal stripes down his arm—17 in all. On his chest a handprint in yellow left, showing prisoners; he'd taken them.

The man with painted eyes, one red and one yellow. Dream a little dream of me. They do. The painted eyes, they tell it. One last call, they said it was in vain. In vain I am trying to tell you.

In Vain I have told you. ©NIKIL

In battle at the hand of another man. More often than not we knew him. He knew us. Deaths, every one has meaning, bind us together. Dog soldier or not. Earth, we are fastened to it.

Gathering of men. Sometimes we sit. Together, sometimes we are sitting. Confirmation—we want it. Young men will say, "Hey, look, I shot him. Here at the base of the arm. Here where it fastens at the three points in the back. Here, are you looking?"

We sit together. No matter how strong the hatred. There is power in the sitting. While we do, we look, at times for confirmation. Codes. We have them.

"He says he shot you, here. Let me see it." We have rules; we have breaks and we have societies. We keep them.

He stretches his arm out from his chest. The scar a knot of twisted flesh extending through the triceps.

At times we meet along with our hate, it's something we do. Face to face, in a truce. When we are keeping one and in a war when we are warring.

We died good deaths. Man to man. People to People. We died old. We were eaten—sometimes by bears. Wolves. They ran from his face, Four Bears, the Mandan. He went out in the breaking of winter, he and The Two Ravens, the esteemed Hidatsa, a chief of the Dogs. After the winter that was brutal, after the night of the falling stars. They knew there would be war and great mortality. The winter, they passed it together. The men and the traveling two. They had meager provisions. At the sight of the first prairie dog and the first white headed eagle he went out with The Two Ravens. Together, these two, they killed five buffalo and returned with them to the fort and in a great show of who, together, they were as men, they dispensed the meat along with several blankets.

It was a retched time for Maximilian. He received the gifts and he was given a painted hide. Buffalo. He took them with him, along with a caged bear that managed to survive entrapment, confinement and the same desperate winter. On the plains, he took them and they lay in the Linden-Museum in Stuttgart, a permanent part of their collection.

Four Bears, the Mandan, he slept by the fire. In the morning he rose, leaving his robe there on the floor. Expecting it to be lifted. Maximilian thought him presumptuous at best. These Indians like to be picked up after. Their system—he had no understanding. This morning he drew, Mato Tope, himself, for Maximilian who was intensely interested, for his collections. Bodmer loaned him his paints, some leaves, in exchange for the image. The Cheyenne, when he killed him.

That very day Maximilian commissioned a bear claw necklace for himself, in exchange for a string of blue glass beads and an otter skin. Mato Tope would use them for his regalia. Personal adornment, he took great care. When we did these things. Meaning who you were and how you became that. People. A personal sense of style—of course—but an earning, a history of movements made, embodied. Objects worn for their power.

Check your label.

paatúh.©NIKIL

Fashion—turn to the left. Fashion—turn to the right. Value merely an indication of cost. She rides the bus thinking of hides. They come to her fully painted. Four Bears, the Mandan, he gave to Maximilian hours of philosophical explication. His people, the Mandan, he told of their origins and understanding. His painted hide, buffalo, he gave that too. Objects retain their power. The N Judah Owl, she rides it out to the Ocean to Itkxnaánu', his portrait, she drew with ink. It hangs where she sleeps.

On the hide, Four Bears, the Mandan, is most often drawn in red and black. In the center he is riding a yellow horse, his front legs painted solid black, his rump drawn across with a diamond, the tip of which touches a second diamond painted just underneath the body. His horse has a war bonnet as does Mato Tope.

Six scenes are shown on the hide, each depicting a moment.

He, the President, he wanted us all with one head, to start thinking. Why we came. This I told you before. Wah. In 1837. Listen. Today, our faces hold on. Skin. Bones. AIDS. Diabetes. Four Bears Casino. Four Bears, the Mandan. Second chief, káNIt. Friend to the whites. Last. Words. Words. I told you. Before. Listen.

Rise up

all together

and not leave one

of them alive.©NIKIL for Mato Tope

Part One: Those Who Thunder (pp. 8-9)

2012-01-18T06:52:00.000-08:00

No Dakota Were Harmed During The Scrawling of This Graffiti. My name is NIKIL and I approved this message.

There are many, this boy, that girl, believing the time is over. Fashion a dream catcher hung between the breasts of a beautiful woman. One cliché follows another. Bare bellies and leather bags. Cash. Credit. To market to market to buy a fat pig. Trade an anachronism the people want no part of.

Papillon squats in the old Arrow Liquor and Market writing The New Everlasting Feeling. Big Norman runs a school for delinquents from a flat on 26th street. His Honda perpetually parked at the curve in the pavement, where 26th turns onto San Jose. Mitchell's a nightmare just around the corner. Isaac Many Goats walks his flock in a circle from Pueblo to San Francisco, south of 40 and north of 70, through the Rockies and over the Sierra.

Ramona Wilson is going home.

Five point stars form in the night. Our movement determines their shape. Five triangles and one pentagram. Geometry is more than a subject for high school, it's a means of navigation.

Every birth has meaning.

Each death is different.

In 1837.

Killing. Stealing horses. When we did those thing we used to have each other. That's a lot to lose. That's a lot to have.

Cholera. Small Pox. Free Market Economy.

Drugs. Alcohol. Diabetes.

My name is NIKIL and I approved this message.

Part One: Those Who Thunder

2012-01-14T08:12:00.000-08:00

Part One:

“Those Who Thunder”

-Linda Hogan

Ni[ch’ih roams the land along with his companion, Darkness. Small birds settle into their nests. Even kaáka, the raven, is silent. Rainbow warriors wait with dawn while spirit horses walk the horizon—Bloody Knife, Four Bears the Mandan, Bloody Hands, the ancients and Old M2’ii live their lives today much as they will tomorrow. Sunrise. Sunset. Listen. I am arriving. The first snow has fallen and a fire has been lit. I am cooking a can of coffee. The young come and bring a braid of tobacco.

Wah. I will tell you. Beginning the same. Now. Wah.

Alfred sits on an old kitchen chair in his blue checkered shirt beginning to tell a story. The season is here and stories are evenings, one following the other. Some people come, most don’t, believing the time is over.

Wah. Now I will tell you about the white man’s dream that we make our heads one. Mandan, Hidatsa, Sahnish. We were living then together when the President came, saying he desired it, our heads to be one.

wetatunaa’ittíˆstA. I am going to tell it.

saNIˆstaaká went around making treaties to quiet the wars. Killing. Stealing horses. When we did those things. They were and the President came thinking, together, he could shush the entire nation. saNIsahníˆs. Indians. He made this country, one, and wanted us to act the same.

A letter. It was in it, the bringing from the soldiers. They were living then in Bismarck, itUhtaáwe. They lived, there in camps, with horses. I am talking now, there were no cars, no trains. There was a letter and they brought it. Along the river, riding the steamboat through so many countries. The river passing through and the letter riding on it.

They arrived. Bringing the letter to us, at our camp. When we were camping together, the three: Mandan, Hidatsa, Sahnish.

witiwaáko’, “People, however many are here, tribes in this country will meet at the Little Shell River. The President wants you, three here, to go too.”

Stone, my Grandmother’s father, saNIˆstaaká. He spoke these words, knowing both, saNIˆstaaká and sahniˆs. The letter knowing one. witiwaáko, “This is what this is saying.”

sákaa’A, Son of Star, NAhtsuutaaká, White Shield, his father, witiwaáko’, “it must be good, for us to go. Being good, we must go.”

witiwaáko’, Carries Moccasins, he was always going there. His sister being married to a Cheyenne, he is one. Eight days journey. He knows the distance. The place they gather, paatúh. nawáh. All of you, I will tell it, the going to the assembly.

Four Bears, the Mandan saying, “it must be. The sáhniˆs are going. We will go with.”

Four Bears, the Hidatsa said, “No.”

Excuses, huunaawaanú’, the Hidatsa, he made them.

noowitiwaáko’, saying, “paatúh will be and in going about, us, they will find us. Taking us and make no more till we are gone. They will kill us. What you want, let it go.”

noowitiwaáko’, Son of Star, he said it, “We are the same, now. We will go. I will.”

Riding horses they went. The day they selected, they left on it. Ten days journey, they went. Young Fox getting sick. They turned around, Young Fox and his wife, together on the Heart River, they turned. sáhniˆs riding their horses onto the Platte. Arriving there niiwehneetunaáhkUx.

kuúNUx ˆciití’Iˆs, the Hidatsa, rode the rear, his excuses riding with him.

noowitiwaáko’, Carries Moccasins, “The enemy is here, spread across his land. If they see us, now, they will kill.”

These words bringing, now, kuúNUx IciitíIˆs, the Hidatsa, fear and his fear brought him from the rear into the middle, among the men. The camp a sleep, the night and he sleeping the night, over, in the middle.

Axunána, Carries Moccasins, was young.

noowitiwaáko’, Axunána, “The village we will see it, there. At the blue mountains, we will arrive.”

Late the next day, long into the day, they reached the blue mountains. Wah. This is where we are going. Seeing them, the soldiers came running. Seeing them, noowitiwaáko’, he said, “they are coming to kill us. They are soldiers. They are.”

Now they said, the soldiers, on coming to meet, “Your camp will be here. Your horses, we will take them.”

The tents were made of walls and they brought food. They cooked. Near a camp beside them, they were, sˆciíri, Pawnee. Two men, they said it, “Tomorrow we talk.” Young Wolf, sˆciriiháni’, his mother sáhniˆs, his father sˆciíri, that is what they called him, Young Wolf, “We will be first.”

nawáh. Morning arrived. The huge gathering was there, to the place they were called, all different, sˆciíri were first.

“Iˆswánu, if you live,” he said. The President, noowitiwaáko’, “The president, he will take care of you. How long you live. Iˆswánu. This will be how. Under his care.”

At the time of their speaking the words were good. Now they have turned to deception.

sákaa’A, Son of Star, it was his turn. Speak. Next. Young Wolf called him, then, when he was done, “wah, sáhniˆs, the time is yours. Your turn. Make it.”

Son of Star, he did.

He spoke while they made plans.

He spoke in his turn, witiwaáko’, “You want for us all to live as children, saNIsahÍs, you call together. Meeting here, as one. Our children you want them. Speak English so we can understand. Giving us food. Giving us whatever we want. Placing us inside a fence, where we, saNIsahíˆs, live inside. All of us, you call here, Indians, this country, this is as you call it, all where you live and we will be bounded to a portion where we can build a place to dwell. Inside of it.”

There were words and after they were spoke the President asked Son of Star to give him men. Men to enlist, in case of war. More killing. More horse steeling. When we were doing it. If after these plans being made one should still rise up, war. Men he promised.

Placing there heads together they made it.

The Crows spoke next. And now that was the end.

In the end there was dancing and the people were happy. Son Of Star, noowitiwaáko’, “If they give me anything it is yours.” He said this, now, to Carries Moccasins. Even if it was an eagle feather received. He promised it on to the man who led them on the ten days journey. They were happy now for their coming. Even the enemy was different and happiness danced long into the evening.

They gave him their most beautiful horses, Son of Star. Now, he made his mistake. He kept everything then for himself.

noowitiwaáko, “You, all, go.” And he left, Axunána. With his sister, he went to live in their country, the Cheyenne. After his going, their way—Sahnish— was hard. They wandered lost on the long prairie, stretching long into all directions.

Almost not arriving. Back to the village, where it was, here, they made it.

The soldiers came and enlisted the men and Bloody Knife was among them.

They went first, then it was our turn, to the dwelling school to learn English.

This was the reason for the friendship.

wetireskaá’At.

His face a full round smile, his cheeks a soft frame of red.

Time for a little lunch.

Every winter night is the same; they are stories, following one another. Difference lingers inside the shirt, the cheek, and the character of meaning. Rules are followed by observation. We observe a strict commitment to realizing nawáh, this is the world we live in.

Stories are to be thought over, not spoken, until the next time of telling. A season. Rules provide a structure—discipline, luck, good fortune and h0zh=. A healing—people, Diné, Sahnish. Keep close. Your life, this is, you are living.

One of these men was she, a woman. One Kernel of Corn Woman, they gave her an old name. It was new on her arm. From there she painted the streets with Sharpies. ÓNIKIL. One Kernel of Corn Woman, a name her Grandmother uses, and Alfred. The city traffic roars and she rides MUNI cross town, N Judah, OWL. Men, he promised. Son Of Star and she drew them. He That Strikes. Bob Tailed Bull. Yellow Wolfe. Sitting Bear. Strikes Two. Little Sioux. Soldier. Young Hawk. Not Afraid Of The Enemy. Four Bears káNIt , even the wolves ran from his face. $1.25 will get you to Powell and Market. Black. White. Red and yellow. Passports and Fast Passes. It only takes a moment. Arriving near dawn. Covering billboards. iPod. paatúh. Apple. paatúh. 1837. This morning looming. Small pox. paatúh. One of the men, they promised, was a woman.

Urban Nizhóní: epigrah

2012-01-14T08:00:00.000-08:00

A man by himself was nothing, a shout in the wind. But men together, each acting for each other and as one—even a strong wind from an enemy sky had to respect their power.

-D’Arcy McNickle