The Fire Bird Part 2

Medicine Man, was it not a Brave's hour, Was it not a Warrior's hour, That hour in which I stood unflinching And saw her take him from me?

I, whose heart had possessed him Since we shot the play arrows of childhood, And together chased the painted wings Through the flower fields of the Canawacs.

Then came Prairie Flower, Mate of the Great Sachem, To lead away the mighty strangers.

For many suns and as many moons We feasted and danced gaily.

Was I not brave to wear fine robes, Nightly to chant boastful songs?

My breast was torn and bleeding As the broken wing of the fire bird, Yet many searing times At the command of the Great Sachem Was I made to smile in the Council Lodge, And to dance the Love Dance of the Mandanas; That dance that I had learned in secret From the flying feet of my Mother, Learned only for Mountain Lion, For the great ceremonial of love giving.

Medicine Man, Hear me!

Not again did the eyes of Mountain Lion Travel across the Council Lodge To seek my eyes in understanding.

Couy-ouy had taken his eyes; On her face she proudly kept them, For he saw nought but the blue mist around her, The gleam of her hair, the red bow of her lips.

He heard nought but the luring music Of her echo sweet voice, And the happy song of her quilled robe As she hourly pa.s.sed among our people; While always clinging to her breast or shoulder Proud and fearless as in freedom, Rode the sacred wounded bird of blood redness.

Her father homed in wigwams Near the lodge of the Great Sachem, Rode his hunting pony on the far chase beside him, Sat on high in the councils of our Chieftains.

When the dancing and feasting were over It was known through the voices of the criers That for many moons our visitors Would home beside our campfires, Learning of our wisdom from us, Teaching, where their customs differed.

The Great Sachem was swift to order, The rarest fish from sea or river, The juiciest of the small birds From the snares of the children, The tenderest fawn flesh From the arrows of the hunters, To be brought for the cooking kettles Of the strangers who trusted us.

Every day I watched the slow sun, And at night I danced with the maidens, But no sleep came to my eyes, No hunger came to my body.

My Mother tempted me with bits as sweet As the Sachem had commanded for Couy-ouy, But my parched throat refused them in scorn, My dry tongue found no savour in juicy fatness, My hot hands could not place the beads evenly.

Then it was that my Mother came to my wigwam, And closing the doorway she stood before me, And long and long she looked far into my heart.

Deep in her eyes there gathered the black fury, And a storm like the wildest storm That ever twisted the cedars in wrath, Raged in her rocking b.r.e.a.s.t.s And her lightning flashing eyes.

Fiercely in the silent Canawac motion tongue, Her look burning into my living spirit, She made the sign of the quick kill; And turning she slipped like a vision From my wigwam of torture.

As she crept into the mouth of darkness, O Medicine Man, I knew that she had but made the outward sign For the savage inward purpose Long hardening in my deepest heart.

The next sun, when our mothers sent the maidens With their baskets to the Fall nut gathering, I kept ever close beside Couy-ouy, my enemy, And in my breast there flamed fierce anger, That she had robbed my heart.

Always at the door of her wigwam, Rocking in the sunshine of each dawning, Hung a yellow osier basket woven like a ball, With its ribs placed wide enough apart To give the gifts of light and air, Close enough to prison a flame red bird.

And there, healed of his wounds, But forever broken for flight, On a twig shaped and placed by Mountain Lion, Couy-ouy, the flame feathered voyager of air, Sang a song filled with tears and wailing, The cry of a broken bird heart Pleading for wings and a mate.

The Great Spirit heard his notes of sorrow, But I hardened my heart against the sacred bird; For his golden cage had been cunningly wrought By hands of such great strength that naked They had slain the mountain lion And taken its yellow skin for a ceremonial robe, Its fierce name for the sign of a great deed.

Now I saw in dazed wonder That Mountain Lion had grown papoose hearted.

He was not leading the hunters in the forest; He was not at the head of the fishermen Spearing and netting as of old.

He had proved his manhood in deadly combat; He had won his name by the fiercest fight Ever known among any of our warriors; But now he chose to lie in his wigwam and dream, And I knew what he dreamed, O Medicine Man!

So with soft words and pretty sign talk I led his evil spirit to the bright late flower; I showed her the little flitting creatures.

And when I helped her fill her basket With sweet nuts that were greatly desired, My ear, quick for every sound of menace, Marked the thing the softer one did not hear.

By a slender beckoning blue flower, I measured the distance, And skilfully I led the other nut pickers Far away from the spot of danger.

Then I dared her to race in turn with me To leap the long leap across the nut bushes, To land at the mark of the sky flower, A fair thing to shelter death.

I set down my heaped basket of furry nuts, I gathered my robe to my knees and raced swiftly, I made the leap to which I challenged her, Before her and all of the wondering maidens.

She followed my footsteps like a rift of white light.

She rose high in the air over the sweet nut bushes, But she had not my strength, not my purpose.

My leap carried me far over the danger; But as I turned quickly to watch her I saw her touch earth in smiling confidence, At the mark of the waving sky flower.

When she tore away, her eyes wide in danger, Dragging her robe from the clinging thicket, With greedy eyed, death hungry heart I watched her proud face.

The Great Spirit had not pitied me, If the curved death serpent had struck at her, His awful fangs had missed her soft body.

O Medicine Man, make me magic for the fire bird, Ease my spirit of the snaring water flower.

Many suns I waited in hunger and spirit searching; Far and alone I wandered over the meadows, Beside the white sand sh.o.r.e of the sea water.

One day I lost from my necklace A carved piece of rare blue sh.e.l.l, A beautiful heaven tinted sh.e.l.l, a treasure, Got from traders from the Islands of the seas Far to the south of us--across vast waters; A big sh.e.l.l so precious among us that only one Cost us the weaving of fifty blankets; The greatest wealth known to our people.

Slipping unseen from all the others, I went alone through a trail of deep forest To the back of a far secret cavern I knew, Where lay hidden my precious blue sh.e.l.l, And I cut one small piece from it, For the mending of my necklace.

When I came back to the sun, O Medicine Man, And through the forest followed my trail, I heard the rushing thunder footsteps And the death growl of Black Bear.

I looked, and I saw at the welcoming cavern mouth, Hurrying in from the forest, the b.l.o.o.d.y killer, Mother black bear, gaunt and hard chased, With far hanging tongue and foam dripping jaws; And behind her, panting and whimpering, Her pair of travel worn hungry little children.

Some far tribe had driven her from her home, And with her crying small ones following She was seeking shelter in my treasure lodge.

I watched her turn and forbid her children to enter; Alone, bravely to the inner recesses she went.

Her nose must have told her of my recent body, But she could lead her sleepy cubs no farther, For the death weariness was upon all of them.

So she came back to the cave's homing mouth, Drove her panting cubs to the farthest wall, And making fierce boastful war talk, There she claimed the homing rights of the wild.

I went back to where our women were working And I began the Brave's task of drilling my sh.e.l.l.

Couy-ouy came and lay beside me, watching.

Her tribes had no knowledge Of such rare precious ornaments.

She greatly desired to possess one For her most precious bracelet.

When we were alone, as I worked I told her how to find my cavern And where the sh.e.l.l was hidden on a high ledge.

Her heart knew no fear; Her eyes shone with gladness When I told her my great secret of blue treasure And that, if she would go alone, She might take for herself one piece.

The one I was drilling so carefully I must use For the mending of my rarest necklace.

When I thought of the dripping jaws Of the killer, ravenous, tormented to frenzy, And looked at the smoothness of her body, I relented; I knew mercy.

It was in my softened heart To say that the hunters must go with her; But before my lips of compa.s.sion Could speak the words my heart said, With the joy light shining on her face, She told me in happy confidence: "I will take but one small piece To ornament my richest bracelet, And I will polish it smooth even as you do, And Mountain Lion shall carve it for me."

O Medicine Man, look in mercy upon me!

Darest say she drove not her own stake, Lighted her torture fire with fearless hands?

Darest say she knew not that Mountain Lion Would now make her our Chieftainess?

Darest say the buzzing of a swarm of maidens Had not told her many suns past That Mountain Lion was my man, That he had danced the Mating Dance Of the Mandanas with me, Before the a.s.sembly in the Council House On the night of her coming among us?

All that night my eyes surrounded her wigwam.

With first dawn ray she came slipping forth And darted down the veiled trail That led through the deep forest.

Well had I marked the path That ran to the cave's mouth.

When she had gone I closed the slender opening Through which I had unceasingly watched The moon's long journey for her, And for the first time in many pitiless suns I fell into the deep visionless sleep Of the body tired past endurance.

It was near evening when my Mother wakened me.