Sunday, February 28, 2010

BEING INDIAN part 2




BEING INDIAN IS...hearing from non-Indians how rotten the government has treated Indians, but still voting them back into office.

BEING INDIAN IS...listening to people tell you about their grandmother or great grandmother that was a Cherokee Indian Princess.
BEING INDIAN IS...seeing other Indians in search for an Indian identity.
BEING INDIAN IS...being greeted by non-Indians with pseudo names from real ancestors of your tribe.BEING INDIAN IS...having to prove with documentation that you are one, when other races and people in the country don't have to.



the flag of the Crow Creek nation

BEING INDIAN IS...knowing that your ancestors were slaughtered like animalsin the name of Christianity, and then being told that Christianity is out to save us.
BEING INDIAN IS...buying "authentic" Indian jewelry made in Taiwan or Japan
BEING INDIAN IS...learning of people becoming Indian without having an Indian mother or father.
BEING INDIAN IS...finding out that people think all Indians lived in tipis.



Native American Mashpee Wampanoag woman named Cheryl

BEING INDIAN IS...being told that Columbus discovered America from his ship, when we were watching him from the shore.
BEING INDIAN IS...trying to relate to people who say they are mathematically 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, etc. degree of blood.
BEING INDIAN IS...wearing braids and being called a "hippie" by those who object to long hair.
BEING INDIAN IS...being whipped for speaking your own tribal language when on the school ground premises.
BEING INDIAN IS...watching your elders boast of Indian pride and leadership, between swigs of liquor from a half-empty bottle.
BEING INDIAN IS...having your brothers and sisters that are enrolled in the tribe treat you as second class citizen because you and/or your family chose not to walk the government's path.

Copyright 2001 - The NDN Rights Project - All Rights Reserved. For information on linking and usage contact director@ndnrights.org


 Geronimo, Apache war chief, & the bain of the United States advance upon Turtle Island


Friday, February 26, 2010

a Story by Lady Hawke 2



Majestic Buck


The majestic buck walked through a thicket of trees, stepping cautiously over old mossy logs in his path. He was one with the Earth as he listened to the song of crickets all around and admired the beauty of daisies peeking up through the mulch of leaves and pine needles resting on the ground. Suddenly, he spied a female of his herd sniffing a strange object up ahead. It had not been there yesterday, and through his years of experience, he recognized the block of salt and knew it was not good.

He snorted commandingly at the female, “Get away from there!”

She only pawed the ground rebelliously and lowered her head to lick at the hard substance.

The buck was ready to go to her and force her to leave the block of salt, when the very trees seemed to shudder and cringe in fear as a loud booming sound echoed through the forest.

The buck froze as did every other living thing in the forest, watching the female stumble and drop, her life blood spilling onto the forest floor.

Then he was shouting to the others in his herd, “Run! Get out of here!”

And the peace of the woods was disrupted by the sound of them, crashing through trees, running away from the female who gasped her last breath beneath the triumphant gaze of the hunter who shot her.



Beyonce Knowles has a radiant power from within her




Tina Knowles and daughters Beyoncé and Solange have always drawn on the wonderful details and techniques passed on by Tina's mother, Agnéz Deréon. With Deréon, they've developed a line reflective not only of her Creole influences, but also her daring approach and bold ideas. Beyoncé and Solange have always brought a fresh eye and playful attitude to fashion as they've developed their own individual styles. They are the quintessential Deréon girls.








Thursday, February 25, 2010

COMMUNITY & TOBACCO

Yairi Sanomaa
...But is it not like sacred tobacco, once used for ceremonies with respect? When the respect was lost, did it not become a dangerous addiction? I admire the ways of the hunter with respect, who practises the dance. I pity the hunter who doesn't know the dance, and I distain the hunter who mocks the dance and the traditions, and kills only for pleasure. My heart is wounded to see a mutilated carcass. I must nevertheless try to forgive all, because something made a creature of God, a human, an upright animal take pleasure in killing. This is not the way. I say this with respect and know in my heart you will agree, that when we hunt, or eat the flesh, we must be mindful of the sacrifice.

My skin is white, and I must call back to ancestors from long ago who also knew the dance. All humans once knew the dance.

I speak with great respect to all people. I must have courage to speak. All plants of the forest and field are sacred. Tobacco grew wild before cultivation and people, the upright animals, knew it was sacred. They began to ... See Morecultivate it, but they kept their respect. In my past I was a tobacco picker, but by then the respect had been lost. The sacred plant was harvested in kilns and shipped to Imperial Tobacco. I had the addiction then, and did not pay respect. I had to learn it.
 
I learned from a friend, another tobacco picker from the Mohawk nation, that tobacco was sacred, not an industrial product. We smoked unpolluted tobacco, from the kiln. Imperial Tobacco poisons the tobacco with chemicals. They make it more dangerous, and addictive. I respect all those who are able to grow their own natural tobacco.

I know communities rely on the trade in tobacco. I respect these communites and will support them, not with the purchase of tobacco, for my addiction is broken, but by my words that I speak openly. I know the people of this land have many unsettled land claims. I know the history of European conquest. And I honour the people of this land and have stood beside them at the barricades in Caledonia, Ontario. Their cause is just. I respect the elders who know and teach the old ways. They know the truth. And I speak with great respect and with a small voice. I do not speak casually in this forum, but with care. If I misspeak, please forgive me, give me time, and teach me. Thank you. Aho.

Moon Red Thunder
The dance is what's important more than where you come from. IT's where you're going and who you are that counts. Such a great day today; enjoying light and blessings.

Gregory E. Woods
“Yairi, your Life has connected with Tobacco, the Hunt, and the Sacredness of those relationships. That relationship holds life, and traditionally held community intact in some tribes like one of mine. Rebuilding community in our lifetimes does reach backward. The Sankofa Bird teaches the value of a historical perspective in decision making, and Children hold us in the present in such a way we find ourselves shaping the future for them with an awareness we had not known lived within us. This circular capacity to create is natural. It is born from an aspect of our wholeness. Our wholeness needs practicality. Without the practicality of the linear approach to living we are outside of the what brings us together as a community. We are all dancing somewhere in the Circle, along the lines, and from within ourselves together, and separately in the present held by the breath of our Ancestors who dreamt of our futures.”

HARRIET TUBMAN vs NIGGER SHIT


freedom is never found it is fought for



It is difficult to acquire a clear mind, to maintain a free spirit, to overcome darkness of the soul and confusion of mind and beliefs. The hardness of broken people ruling over people and the coldness of policy makers that interferes with the collective wisdom of mothers and fathers moves and affects our walk. The fact that we have accepted their expert opinions without the warrior spirit we were born with tells us a lot about ourselves.

It is a fight to become. It was a fight to be born from mother's womb. Insanity makes sense in the context of the sacred Medicine Wheels. Positioned on one wheel I am familiar with Insanity lives south on this wheel looking north at Growth. There is a relationship between the two. Some of our gifted healers live with Insanity as a grounding force capable of propelling them to grow their medicine. This is not a path for the faint of heart. This is a warrior's path.

Harriet Tubman spoke right into the jacked up paradigms of African ex-slaves during an interview that produced an eye opening response. Her answer to the remark about the number of slaves she freed is revelatory.

"There would have been more had they known they were slaves."

The gift of what I am saying is to fight for your freedom from whatever binds you. To understand freedom understand its denials.

Fight for your freedom.



©Gregory E. Woods 2008
Dawn Wolf
Keeper of Stories

Harriet Tubman had to kill some who wanted to turn back.  Can you envision what that took to do that?  How much fight do you have in you?


Legitamacy, Lesbians & Lorraine Hansberry



Why Is Playwright Lorraine Hansberry’s Lesbianism Still A Secret In 2008?
2008 February 23


The ABC television movie “A Raisin In The Sun” will be broadcast on February 25th 2008 at 8:00pm. The television film fulfills the black quota for “black history month”. Pop star Sean Combs is the protagonist Walter Lee Younger. The title of the movie refers to black gay poet Langston Hughes poem “Harlem”.

African American lesbian playwright Lorraine Hansberry’s legendary play once again will be brought back to television to reach a new generation next week. Hansberry was the first black lesbian playwright to have a play produced on Broadway in 1959. “A Raisin In the Sun” was a huge success for Hansberry and launched her career.

The general public of course does not know that Lorraine Hansberry was a lesbian due to homophobia. Why is black lesbianism considered “private” yet “heterosexuality” is a part of the public domain? Although Hansberry married a white Jewish man Robert Nemiroff in 1953 the couple separated in 1957 and divorced in 1964.Hansberry was conscious of her lesbian identity and she negotiated between the public and private spheres. Black lesbians encountered racism from the mainstream, white gay culture, and also persecution from heterosexual blacks.

Lorraine Hansberry’s lesbian identity emerges from the articles she wrote for the lesbian publication “The Ladder” in the late 1950s. Hansberry did not use her full name when she wrote articles for “The Ladder” she used her initials L.H. instead. In the 1950s in America gays and lesbians lived in fear due to witch hunts against homosexuals. Black lesbian women encountered a triple form of oppression in relation to their race, gender, and sexual orientation.

Can you imagine the difficulties black lesbians endured in the 1950s? Homosexuality was still considered a mental illness that can be cured. The topic of human sexuality was still taboo in the 1950s. America was sexually repressed due to heterosexual male domination and male supremacy. The racial and sexual apartheid existed in the United States and black lesbians lived in constant danger due to racism, sexism and homophobia. The civil rights and gay movements did not gather strength until the 1960s.

Black lesbians encountered racism from white lesbians and were barred from entering white lesbian bars and establishments during the 1950s. Black lesbians also endured gender discrimination due to being women and unwanted sexual advances of dangerous, violent, and hostile heterosexual men.

Hansberry was indeed a lesbian but this important component of black queer history should not be erased by the homophobic Occidental world. Heterosexual black publications always ignore the important fact Hansberry was a lesbian. I didn’t know Lorraine Hansberry was a lesbian until I read lesbian activist, feminist, poet, and writer Adrienne Rich’s incisive essay “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence”. Rich’s analysis is correct society attempts to erase, diminish, and destroy the contributions of lesbians in many ways. I believe the silence about Lorraine Hansberry’s lesbianism is due to the negative attitude that still exists against homosexuals.

Why is the term lesbianism treated like a scatological word? One argument is some straights believe “it doesn’t matter” and if people discover that Lorraine Hansberry was a black lesbian it might “scare people off” from watching the movie. Why is there this invisible code and this silent barrier? If black lesbian emancipation is to occur why is black lesbianism still a social taboo? Society appears to have a love and hate relationship with lesbianism.

The political, cultural, social, and artistic merits of black lesbians such as Lorraine Hansberry must be celebrated and not treated as some shameful abhorrent secret. It is the year 2008 so why are we still reticent? Why hasn’t this final chasm been shattered and the truth still shrouded in silence? Lorraine Hansberry proves that black gay people care about the black community. Often heterosexual blacks believe black gays and lesbians only focus on sexual orientation and ignore race. Lorraine Hansberry proves through art that she was cognizant of the racial, social and political polemics blacks endured during the civil rights era. “A Raisin In The Sun” is about a fictional family struggling to survive in 1950s Chicago at a time when America’s social and racial apartheid was at full strength...

http://orvillelloyddouglas.wordpress.com/2008/02/23/why-is-sean-combs-the-sta...

A story by Lady Hawke



Mouse in a Maze


The dream, like morning mist, shimmers to life. I am running down dark alleyways, scattered like some maze, twisting and turning, often leading to nowhere. I double back to get out, only to find another brick wall, impenetrable. Teetering on the edge of panic, gasping for breath, I spy a man leaning against a wall.

“You, there,” I call out. “I need help. I can’t seem to find my way out of this alley.”

The man turns toward me with a look of cool assessment. “Indeed, is that so?” He responds as he raises a pipe to his lips. The smell of tobacco wafts through the dark air.

“Yes, it’s so,” I say as rain begins to fall from the sky. Thick heavy droplets fall with loud splashes on the pavement below. The sound is so loud I can barely hear myself think, so I raise my voice, shouting above the sound of the rain. “Please show me the way out.”

He merely chuckles as he coolly observes my frustration, making no move to comply.

“Did you not hear me, sir,” I say, my panic returning. “I need help out of this maze of alleyways. I’m lost.”

The man smiles regretfully. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you. You must find your own way out.”

My frustration boiled over and I shouted at the man, “Oh bugger you! I am only dreaming. If only I could wake up and be gone from this dark, cursed place! If only I could wake up, you, sir, would be no more.”

The man took a long drag from his pipe and exhaled slowly. He eyed me curiously and laughed once more at my plight. “My dear, that would only happen if this were your dream.”

“What do you mean” I spat, “Of course it’s my dream. Who else’s could it be?”

The man pushed himself from the wall, and as he did so, he began to grow at an enormous rate. He became a giant right before my eyes, and he stepped over the wall I was so desperate to pass. Then he turned and looked down at me still trapped in the dark alley.

“It’s my dream,” he said calmly. “And you are merely a mouse in a maze. It’s up to you to get out.”

Laura Lawless

DEATH SONGS


HawaH in meditation


Gregory E. Woods, African Absaroka NDN
“Dying is the last of act of power we have in this lifetime. The whole of our lives evolves around death. It is a constant exercise. It is a dance. It is a consistent presence in the everyday affairs of each day. Our sleeps are the little deaths. Knowing this, and understanding how vital this relationship is to living a good life the end, the... See More last act of power should be sung to; hence the reasons we, Indians, have always prepared death songs. These are the words of a Grandfather, a Keeper of Stories, and a Keeper of the Drum. AHO!”

 Mereana Taki, Iwi woman Bone People, New Zealand
"One of our words for 'dying' is mate (sounded as mar teh). It is also the word for 'desire' ...for 'longing' ...for 'yearning'. Whatever dying is ...the Soulbearers vessel no longer serves its Earthly purpose ...as bearer. Our tangihanga are our ceremonial rituals for 'realm crossing'. The immortal Self continues to its formless journey as All that... See More IS. Perhaps we no longer understand this mistaking the vessel for the destination of All that IS. The tangata ora ...the conscious ... Soulbearer changes status as Tihei Mauri ora ...breathing the consciousness of this Realm to ...Tihei Mauri mate ...crossing to the next Realms. Tangihanga remains the last refuge of our cultural practices which has not be broken apart by our Colonizing relatives. We are in ironic ways 'the best' at this dying ceremonial thing as ...our Tribalz drop everything they are doing and attend. Many leave jobs to attend what takes often 3 days solid in ceremony. The 'living' and 'the dead/tupapaku' farewell each other, re connect Tribalz ties, arrange marriages, touch the faces of new children and then ...return to lives designed by the power base of Strangers who rape and pillage our Mother and flaunt our freedoms like jewellery as Food bowls literally become the toilet bowls for greedy selfish chronically asleep and disappeared material BEings."

Scott Reimers
I don't yet either. Deaths can be simple exits from this experience, but they can also have power and meaning. My focus right now is choosing the power and meaning of my life let alone my death. However, when my time comes I would like my death to also have power... When the time comes, I'll have a better understanding of its purpose. Who ... See Moreknows, I kinda like the idea of an expression of joy toward death... let people see love of life and death being the same. Shake the silly people who are afraid of death up a bit and shake the people who are afraid of living up a even more!



Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Carmen Stevenson's provocative beauty


"Carmen I appreciate your encouragement, the power of your gift, and the simply fact that you have found your voice, teach, share, and touch the world with your medicine."

Gregory E. Woods


MAY IKEORA, prayer for you


"May Ikeora, as an elder, I pray the God you serve assist you as you embrace the Goddess so obviously nurtured within you." - Gregory E. Woods


an AFRICAN-AMERICAN CREATION STORY

THE RETURN OF OSIRIUS
By: Carmen Stevenson

As I lie with him
I hear the pulse of his heart
Beat… it’s rhythm sacred
like the drum,
becomes a song with my own.

I feel the strength of his body
Strong, like the strength of my people.
He is the color of mystery
Black, like the birth of creation.
He is warm like the sun…Africa’s jewel.
His hair like ebony ringlets
provides a halo for a Master Mind.

In his face I see the boy
of his Larger Self Waking.
Here lies the Original Man
A synthesis of Malcolm and Martin.
As I put my head over his heart,
His arms encircle me…I feel eternity.

Then his heart spoke to me and said:
‘Queen of my love’, I have returned to you
for four hundred years I have been held captive
scattered to the four corners of the earth,
decapitated and castrated, crucified
before the world.

You also walked the
‘Valley of the Shadow of Death’.
I could not be there for you then,

For I was not a man…
Alone you bore the weight of caring
for our family, a weight I was denied to share.
I saw in your face ‘My Black Flower’
the determination to survive.

It is through your womb that we yet exist.
In your affliction you saw and understood
My conquered condition.
Your eyes spoke and said
‘I love you still’…
Your love was the resurrection of my Return.

I am the Osirus that lies in the soul
of every Black Man,
who has been redeemed by the love
of a Black woman.
I have climbed from the pit of the beast
and stand with my back unbent.

It is a new day, justice has prevailed
and Amen-Ra has given me my crown
and my throne.
Isis, my queen sit next to me
For I have returned.

The Oracle: The Voice of Visionary Poetry
Page 75, 76
© 2001 All Rights Reserved.

my son Lemuel (One Wolf) & his girlfriend Talia


BLACK INTELLIGENCE

I am an Afrikan Spiritual Abolitionist. I am the author of two books entitled; "The Liberation of the African Mind" "The Key to Black Salvation and Repent: From Jesus Back to God. You can view and/or purchase books at http://www.blacksalvation.com/

Shaun Robinson in the company of excellence


photo of Dr. Cornel West, Atty. Londell McMillian, Shaun Robinson, Jesse Jackson, BET's Debra Lee, Toure, CNN's Roland Martin


“The essence of power is within relationships!”
- Dawn Wolf, Keeper of Stories


Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Ivy Hylton



Ivy Anderson Hylton’s lineage can be traced to the great contralto Marian Anderson, who helped to raised the consciousness of a nation and break the color barrier at the New York Metropolitan Opera. Ivy is an anointed vocalist & healer.
Ivy Hilton on FACEBOOK

AFRICAN NATIVE-AMERICAN STORY: 9/11




December 30, 2001


Rev. Sanders

Third Street Church of God
1246 New Jersey Ave.
Washington DC

Dear Rev. Sanders,

Intelligence, responsibility for actions and decisions, honest assessments, and humility must be in an operative mode. In its stead a mad, idiotic buying and selling of American flags have replaced the natural response to someone having us by the balls. The nation is living in fear, seeing terrorist in every son and daughter of Ishmael, a bomb in every loud sound, a conspiracy in every brown mouth whispering. This is where we are right now, as a nation.

Unknown assailants have us, as a country and as individuals, by the balls in a vice grip and we are play-acting and posturing like our national heroes (our lone wolf heroes, Clint Eastwood, Charles Bronson, Cool Hand Luke, etc.) and President Bush’s image of self, John Wayne? As fathers, mothers, leaders, a group, cities, states, and a country we should be alarmed, shamed, enraged that our President endangers his constituents by disallowing an honest assessment, any revelatory discourse about our foreign policies, actions and approaches in Africa and the Middle East, that fueled the dark intent of the architects of the 9-11 bombings. In its stead we swagger patriotically into combat with an ill-defined enemy leaving the country vulnerable and largely in the dark, ignorant about what is really going on, and seemingly blind to our truths as a nation and a force in global war and politics. A moronic idea to fight and eradicate evil with bombs, technology, and solders has become a rallying cry.

From the November elections to the present Bush isolated and distinguished himself by refusing to participate in the international conference on racism, disregarded the decades of research and findings on global warming, pollution and the obvious solutions. He displays disrespect for the earth and a callous intent towards the poverty of other nations, and he supports any atrocity committed by Israel.

In New York, assassins killed 6,867 (including the missing and the presumed dead), collapsed 450,000 tons of concrete, steel and glass to the earth, destroying in two horrific hours more office space than exists in all of San Francisco’s financial district. 61 countries lost citizens in the bombings. 8 Islamic countries lost citizens. 23% of Americans tried to find out if they had lost someone in the September 11th attack on American soil. 3 U.S. citizens were murdered in anti-Muslim hate attacks. Total monetary damages from the attacks exceeded $70 billion. And into the dark vanished the illusions of American life. The smoke left us with choices, options and history. History with neighbors is almost always exposed to light. A conflict ripe with dangers has within its very make up problem areas to be examined and viewed from various angles with intelligence and detachment.

The issues of race in America are working in the midst of our terror. “Our shit don’t stink, and a need to feel good about themselves, no matter what was done to anyone else” are two elements of the paradigm of white racism exposed and silently challenged by people of color worldwide. Our court-appointed president asks the nation to be patriotic, suspend introspection on the sequence of events that led up to the bombings. He asks Americans and other countries to choose sides and fight on the side of right, freedom and democracy from the point of illusion of who we think we are as a nation, a corporation, and a force in the global community.

Our government excuses any evil, any terror Israel initiates and inflicts on people and no one is supposed to be ‘pissed off’ about this? For fifty years we have bombed countries: Japan, China/Korea (1950’s), Guatemala (54), Indonesia ’58, Cuba (between ‘56-’60), Guatemala ’60, Congo ’64, Laos ‘64-’73, Vietnam ‘61-’73, Cambodia ’69, Guatemala ’67, Libya (’86 we killed his daughter trying to assassinate their leader), Granada ’83, El Salvador & Nicaragua the 1980’s, Panama, Iraq, Sudan ’98 (bombing a chemical plant, An error, We compensated no one.), and Afghanistan in 1999. A few days before the attack on New York guess what we were doing in Iraq? We killed eight people bombing the country!

If the United States of America did not profit from the drug trade, facilitate its manufacturer and distribution, train and create assassins, topple governments, install dictators, commit acts of terror against nations, kill innocents by the thousands, consume such an obscene percentage of the world’s resources, break treaties, lust for war and conflict, sell weapons, technology, and ideas to countries for a season and eventually betray or use them for our own benefit right would be on our side.

If history did not record the chemical warfare used against the First Nations People, or the massacre of innocents at Wounded Knee or Sand Creek, the undeclared war on the Seminoles and the Africans in Florida or record hundreds of broken treaties, the murders or terrorist acts done in the name of the Christ Jesus and Progress, I would wave the flag and take up arms against the schools of terror active in the world today. But I cannot. We created the conditions that led to the September 11th bombing. This country is covered in blood. Like its president the heart is full of war and the mouth is full of pleas for peace and reconciliation and the eyes tell the nature of this dichotomy. Patriotism? We respond to the terror we created with patriotism? Patriotism is not a defense or an offensive. It does not prevent death or shield against terrorism; it merely denies and obscures.

Envy and the larceny of economics has tailored our relationship with many nations alongside a deeply felt urgency to make freedom a part of the world’s people. Racism, commerce, progress, and war are energy foods of a restless nation consumed with the fire of war, dominance and the acquisition of things. We are a complex society. Study is required to fathom the myth of America, the reality of America and the stories of America, the contradictions of America.

Our reaction to September 11 has insured that we will be attacked again and succeeded in sustaining the energy that fuels contempt for our ways and approaches to interacting with the rest of the world. We are allowing an opportunity to heal many wounds and thus usher in a profound healing into the world. This moment will escape detection by most Americans because nationally we reside within a Medicine Wheel of Darkness and we are wealthy, mighty in war and unapologetic.

The Medicine Wheels teach that the circle or the wheel is the religion of the living. All things seek the Circle. The deer, the fox, the dog sleep in a circle. The Womb is an opening, a circle. The world is a circle. The Zero Teachers passed down the greatest of all discoveries: The Zero to the People many centuries ago. The Christian’s creation story says God spoke the world into existence giving their God a mouth from which came the Word. The mouth, the Womb, the entrance to homes of the Ant People, the Mole People, the Snake and the Spider Peoples, an embrace, the nest of birds, the circular path of our lives from birth to resurrection is the Way of, the understanding of the Circle. The paths of the Four Winds move in circles from the North, the South, the East and the West. The Sacred Wheels are teachers, mirrors. Lies circulate around the worlds. Truth circulates within the breast of a knowing soul with courage to speak into the face of opposition. Truth speaks from the eyes and the lives of our children who mirror and mimic the veracity of our beliefs, the stances we hold in the world and the concepts we live by as adults negotiating in the worlds of politics, commerce, development, war, parenting, religion and power. The powers, the mentality, the people who govern America, the governing forces in American spirit and daily living obviously revolve around the Medicine Wheel of Darkness.

South on the wheel of darkness is greed—for physical things, for the manifestation of ideas into the physical through unworthy manipulation and accumulation through theft and, often, abuse.
West envies other’s dreams wanting to take what other people have accomplished.
North is the fixation of ideals, the inability to grow, rigidity of perception so that you no longer see the oneness of life but only your own limited position within it.
East of the wheel is the need for manipulation and control and jealousy

Their [the white men’s] Wise Ones said we might have their religion, but when we tried to understand it we found that there were too many kinds of religion among white men for us to understand, and that scarcely two white men agreed which was the right one to learn. This bothered us a good deal until we saw that the white man did not take his religion any more seriously than he did his laws, and that he kept both of them just behind him, like Helpers, to use when they might do him good in his dealings with strangers. These were not our ways. We kept the laws we made and lived our religion. We have never been able to understand the white man, who fools nobody but himself.”—Plenty Coups, Absaroka

Over a hundred years have passed since Plenty Coups voiced the common observation of Native peoples worldwide who were forced into encounters with white people. This is a pivotal moment in history, ripe for healing Wheels to be activated. If ever there was a time to repent of the evils we have wrought, as a nation, it is now. The time to allow nations and their millions to emote, to tell their stories and show how our policies and assumptions have affected, destroyed and altered their lives, is now. Today is the moment to listen. Today is the time to ask for forgiveness and allow healing in others and with our soul. We need to be responsible for what our hands have wrought. Waving the American flag doesn’t mean a damn thing. It is a moronic and weak gesture; shallow before the truths we chose to ignore; pale before our self-righteousness. We cannot expect to live, as we are accustomed to for very long. We have dug our grave and created the means to make our demise a reality at the hands of the Frankenstein’s we created over the decades. Who are we alive in the fields of death and acquisition we own and deny? What are we not learning from the ancient Egyptians and the other nations that reigned for centuries? We are a pitifully young nation; teenagers in fact, making gross acts of power, projecting ourselves into dark places those great entities sought to avoid.

There is a powerful and effective Wheel I have used in the dynamics of my own living development: A Medicine Wheel of Apperception & Balance. I ache and I mourn for my country and her predisposition for war: war on poverty, AIDS, alcoholism, drugs, black people, heart disease, terrorism, etc. I ache to share this Wheel but the nature of the beast cannot recognize itself. If Recognition does not take place the Wheel of Apperception & Balance is ineffective. What our Heart needs our thinking [our Mind] cannot see to accept. Let me grieve now for what will come to pass.

Gregory E Woods
African-Absaroka Indian

AUSTRALIA & HER SISTERS



Sport of suppression

The things the Australians did to the indigenous people of Australia was as cruel as any of the practices of the European's of yesteryear. It is well documented. The peculiar thing about present day Aussies is their culture of denial. The Australians stole children, and killed with abandon stomping out the indigenous spirituality as best they could. It goes on.  The British, the Americans, and the Australians enjoy acting the part of evolved benefactors. With the benefit of an education system that supports the illusion of enlightenment these people feel comfort playing this role. Because of the practice of recording their actions it is well documented.

Gregory E. Woods


GARIFUNA

November 1997 the Black Carib culture known, as the Garifuna were reminded of their ancestors' resilient struggle to overcome the brutal racism put forth by the European settlers in the New World. This day marked the 200th anniversary of the arrival of the Garifuna on the shores of Central America after being forcibly removed by the British from the island of St. Vincent located in the Caribbean. Though this culpable relocation of their entire culture by the British was meant to circumscribe the Garifuna, they have survived like members of their ancestry did when they were enslaved and brought from Africa during the Trans-Atlantic slave trade of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.


Today the Garifuna populations can be found in Guatemala, Honduras, Belize and many have migrated to the United States. The Garifuna, also known as the Garinagu, are direct descendants of the "Island Caribs" and a group of African slaves who escaped two ship-wrecked Spanish slave ships near St. Vincent in 1635(Garinagu Early History, 1).

The Island Caribs were descendants of South American Indians known as Arawaks and another group, the Caribs, who migrated from South America to the Caribbean at a later date. Through the admixture of these cultures as well as the influence of European settlers in the Americas, the Garifuna obtained a diverse culture that incorporates African traditions of music, dance, religious rites, and ceremonies; Native American cultivation, hunting, and fishing techniques; and a French and Arawak influenced language.

The Garifuna culture displays many influences of its African heritage, and this is extremely evident when comparing their music with the indigenous music of the African societies from which their ancestors originated. According to one source, "most of the slaves brought to the Caribbean were taken from the Niger and cross Delta regions in the Blight of Benin (present-day Nigeria) in West Africa, and from further south in the Congo and Angola"(A History of Belize 5th chapter, 1).

Much like the music of these areas, the Garifuna style of music relies heavily on call and response patterns. These patterns are less overlapping than many traditional ones found in Africa, but none the less the Garifunas' "leader/chorus organization" is very consistent with those of African styles (Franzone 1995,294).

In addition, the importance of the drum in Garifuna music is another similarity to their African influence. Garifuna music relies heavily on the drum, and in many instances their music is dictated by it. Often times a particular drum style will call for two drummers (except for sacred music, which usually uses three). Typically, one drummer will play a fixed, consistent pattern. This drummer is usually called the segunda player.

Another more intricate part made up of cross-patterns is normally played by the primero player (S.Cayetano, 1). The drums of the Garifuna are usually made of hardwoods that are uniformly shaped and carved out in the centers. The ends of the drums, whether it be one or two, are covered with skins from the peccary, deer, or sheep (S.Cayetano, 1).

These drums are always played with the hands, and some drummers have been known to wrap metal wires around the drumheads to give them a snare-like sound. Some musicians accompany the drums with gourd shakers called sisira, and even instruments like the guitar, flute, and violin have been adopted from early French, English, and Spanish folk music, as well as, Jamaican and Haitian Afro-Caribbean styles (S.Cayetano, 1).

In accompaniment to their music traditions lie the Garifuna songs and dance styles, which are an integral part of their culture. These songs and dance styles that are performed by the Garifuna display a wide range of subjects like work songs, social dances, and ancestral traditions. Some of the work songs include the Eremwu Eu, which is sung by the women as they prepare to make cassava bread, and the Laremuna Wadauman, a song men regularly sing when collectively working together (S.Cayetano, 2).

As for songs and dances in the social context, pieces like the Gunchei are quite customary. In this dance style the men take turns dancing with each woman. Another very popular dance style performed by the Garifuna is called the punta. According to one Garifuna author this style is, " the most popular dance performed at wakes, holidays, parties, and other social events"(S.Cayetano, 2).

It consists of different couples attempting to dance more stylistically and seductively with hip movements than their other competitors. While most of these songs and dances is more modern in origin, the Garifuna still maintain many traditional pieces. One of the most famous of these is called the Wanaragua.

This dance, which is also known as the John Canoe, is a dance that originated in times of slavery and is performed around Christmas time. The participants will dress up in white masks and venture from house to house in order to receive food and drinks from that household. The dance is said to have been started by both the Creole and Garifuna during encounters at mahogany camps where they were forced to work, and the intent was to mock their white slave owners (Palacio 1993,14). Other traditional dances are defined as: "the Charikawi- a mimed dance where a hunter meets up with a cave man and a cow, and the Chumba-a highly poly-rhythmic song, danced by soloists with great individualized style"(S. Cayetano, 2).

While many of the song and dance styles mentioned above are uniquely Garifuna based, none of them emit the echoing tidal wave of African ancestry like Garifuna ancestral rites and ceremonies do. There are traditionally three main ancestral rites portrayed by the Garifuna.

They are defined as: "1. The Amuyadahani- bathing the spirit of the dead

2. The Chuga- feeding of the dead, and 3. The Dugu- the feasting of the dead"(S. Cayetano & F.Cayetano 1984,1). The Garifuna perform these rites because like many African societies they believe that spirits of their ancestors, which are both good and evil have direct impact on the lives of people in the living world.

One author confirms this when she says, "Instances of natural death are prepared for. However, sudden or untimely deaths suggest the influence of evil human or spiritual factors, and much care is taken to prevent the restless spirit of these deceased from returning to bother the living"(Franzone 1995,152). When this unexpected death occurs it is announced to the rest of the community by wailing women who go door to door with the sound of drums (Franzone 1995,152). It is for this reason that the Garifuna take great care in providing for their dead ancestors the three ancestral rites, the most extravagant one tends to be the Dugu.

Since it is recognized that the Garifuna are meshed together with influences from many different cultures; it is also possibly in some degree to begin to separate parts of their culture to determine their roots. One example of this is their Amerindian influences of the Arawaks and Caribs collectively known as the Island Caribs. When the African slaves intermixed with the Island Caribs they brought into the culture many African based influences that have been previously discussed. However, in order to better understand whom the Garifuna are it becomes necessary to relate other adopted characteristics of their culture to they're other major ancestral influence, the Island Caribs. This Island Carib culture was one that was founded on yucca and cassava farming as well as hunting and fishing sometime before 1000AD(Garinagu Early History, 1). It is quite amazing then that the Garifuna women are still widely known for their tradition of making cassava bread (Palacio 1993,1-3). In addition, the Garifuna men have always been known for their maritime skills since they were mainly away hunting and fishing from various islands throughout the Caribbean and Central America (Global Neighbors: Garifuna History, 1). It is not hard to understand then why the Garifuna are both a matrilocal This means that the women are at the center of the household and descendants trace their bloodline through their mother's family. According to one author, "The women are very actively a part of the Garifuna social culture and are known for their leadership ability and articulate speech"(Global Neighbors: Garifuna History, 1). Therefore, while the women are the farmers in which they grow mostly cassava, they are also major role models and figureheads for the young children (Global Neighbors: Garifuna History, 1).

Another influence that the Garifuna had in their defining lines of their culture was the obvious influence of the French during the beginning stages of colonial development in the New World. It was during this time that French missionaries were exploring the region of the Caribbean and teaching the Island Caribs many words of their native tongue, including the use of French numbers and counting systems. Certain expressions were than fused with the Arawak language that the Island Caribs were speaking. This created the Garifuna language that can still be heard counting in French today (Global Neighbors: Garifuna history, 1).

All of these things combined have provided a brief understanding of who the Garifuna are, and where they come from. Furthermore, it has become apparent through reference points to other cultures and more in-depth studies of the Garifuna that their roots were cultivated in many places around the globe. For example, the traditions of their music dance, religious rites, and rituals are all very much seeded in their link to their African ancestry. While the Garinagu forms of subsistence, on the other hand, are more associated with their Island Carib ancestors. Even the European settlers of the New World had a very profound effect on the development of the Garifuna culture. The same culture that is characterized by the blending of distant pieces of worldly influences, driven by the human intuition to survive, and fueled by the desire for freedom.



REFERENCES CITED



1) Palacio, Myrtle 1993 The First Primer On The People Called Garifuni . Glessima Research & Services

2) Franzone, Dorothy 1995 A Critical and Cultural Analysis of an African People in the

Americas: Africanisms in the Garifuna Culture of Belize. UMI Dissertation Services (151-152).

3) Global Neighbors: Garifuna History. Garifuna World [On-line],

Available: http://www.garifuna-world.com/

4) Garinagu Early History. Garifuna World [On-line], Available:

http://www.garifuna-world.com/world.com

5) Cayetano, Sebastian, (1997). Garifuna Music. Garifuna World [On-line],

Available: http://www.garifuna-world.com/

6) Cayetano, Sebastian; Cayetano, Fabian (September 30, 1984). Dugu. Garifuna

World [On-line], Available: http://www.garifuna-world.com/

7) The History of Belize (Chapters 4&5). [On-line], Available: Garifuna-world.com

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Thursday, February 18, 2010

A story from Sweet Cowgirl in Heaven

The Old Horse and the Raven


It was about a country night ago when a wild wind chased its terrible tail across our valley. Without respect for the sleeping kingdom, it suddenly and unexpectedly had raged through the willows and corrals, tore across our yard, and swept over the backs of the horses, cows, and sheep. It clawed at the snow-cat tarp and the rickety, old rooftops plastering snow on the westward side of everything in its path.

The next morning, the old horse that I watch each day, stood shuddering beside the log barn. He knew, as he's known for years, that this was the best place to be during a storm. And he knew, too, that this was the time when the morning rubbed shoulders with the night; when her first ray of sunshine would ricochet off the barn, warming his frail body and burning away the shadows of dawn.

Used to be, this old fella would snort and squeal and run at the front of the herd when the night winds blew. And, used to be, at dawn he would hold his head proud and high, and watch the raven fly by. Used to be, in his prime, he and his teammate were champions - the fastest chariot team in the state. Yes, he was a king.

Later, he was semi-retired to the ranch to spend his remaining days poking through the newborn calves with his cowboy and teaching little kids how to ride with the wind. And once in a while, we'd all look up and watch the raven begin circling overhead. It used to be.

This thirty-year-old horse has remained the king around here, almost forever it seems. He's the head honcho. Ruler of the roost. Cranky boss of all the other saddle horses. Everyone in the pasture answers to him, always - with his bared teeth, pinned ears, and spin and kick moves.

I never liked him much because of his stubborn, pushy attitude, and his cold-jaw and stumbling gait aggravated me. But he had earned his retirement here, honorably, and since my husband liked him, I tolerated this sorrel Quarter Horse named Scoop.

This morning, though, when Scoop looked up at me as I approached, I felt sorry for him. His nostrils vibrated softly, silently, as he turned and shuffled stiffly toward me on stovepipe-shaped hooves. He was glad to see me; he'd been waiting for me. I could see it in his mattered eyes. I brushed the tracks of caked, white winter from his swayed, razor-ridge back, and could feel his washboard ribs as I ran my fingers down his side and through his thick, lackluster, winter coat, which hid his true physical condition.

Softly, I patted his neck a few times and scratched behind his ears, then kicked a solid place in the snow and poured a bait of grain into the hollowed nest. The other geldings stood off at a distance like stone soldiers, and made not a move to steal his treat, because only Scoop and I know he's not the king anymore.

A contented, appreciative rumble hummed in his throat as he began grinding and slobbering and enjoying his feed. As I watched him eat, I guessed we should float the sharp edges off his teeth, again, so he could eat better; and his feet need trimmed, again, too. Time, in many other ways, however, is outrunning our best efforts.

A yip from behind us caused me to swing toward the fence. There, in a futile, almost funny attempt, my heavy-set, old dog was trying to leap into the air toward a big raven that perched on a nearby cap-gate. Irritated, I too, tried to wave the dark predator away, but it preened its sleek, black feathers and chortled deep in his throat, taunting me from deep within his piercing eyes. I tapped Scoop lightly on the butt to send him off to the feed ground, and cussed the old bird aloud, saying, "Ha! It isn't time yet - it isn't time yet."

And just when I thought I had a handle on life, a humbling thought occurred to me, and I laughed under my breath: Maybe the raven waits not for the old horse.

Sweet Cowgirl In Heaven

Beauty, and Fire are Mysterious Creatures

photo: african beauty of Linsey Ellis Singer, from FACEBOOK

...the refresh of beauty in the wind caressing the the day into night... -Dawn Wolf

African-Native woman

"To make sacred fire (tsila-galun-kwe-ti-yu) in the spring, clan representatives gathered wood from the eastern sides of seven trees, peeled off the outer bark, and placed the wood in a circle on the central altar of the town house. The woods included white oak, black oak, water oak, black jack, bass wood, chestnut, and white pine. Once the fire ignited, women carried burning coals to start fresh fires in their homes. The town house fire "never goes out" wrote British trader Alexander Longe in 1725, it burned continuously in each town until it was ceremonially extinguished and rebuilt. Neither embers nor ash could be removed from the fire, nor pipes lit there. Cherokees offered supplications to the fire, whose smoke was "always in readiness to convey the petition on high". The source of heat, light, and smoke rising to the Upper World, wood for the town house fire carried singular significance."

 
British born Amanda White

"Altars are the symbolic and visible point between the seen and unseen worlds. In that space our intent begins to design what is needed to build prayers. Prayers are the masons’ tools of this kind of spiritual work. A woman who has given birth has the powers of the spoken word. What force is stronger than the word, and intent of the creative force of the Mother?" -Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories


absolute beauty of a Mashpee Wampanoag woman - Cheryl

Sometimes the hurt we feel within is our own pride preventing us to go farther and see the sunshine. We cannot see what the Creator has in store for everyone but when we stretch forth and love we will be a part of the growth of all that crave the light. –Moon Red Thunder





VIVICA A. FOX



“Within Vivica A. Fox broil the shared dynamic conflicts buzzing within millions of African-American woman that draws out the wildness of the loins of men, sets the imagination afire with the enormity of her drive, and passion. An ordinary man cannot live with a Vivica A. Fox without the very thing living in his body that drove her to her heights of excellence. Her achievements have run through the challenges of belief and purpose. Isn't it wonderful being in the presence of a middle-aged woman so beautiful and easy on the eyes? A mere gaze upon her leads to an introspective assessment of one's will, purpose and place in life. Isn’t that wonderful?” 

~Gregory E. Woods
(Dawn Wolf, Keeper of Stories) March 25, 2009




Wednesday, February 17, 2010

THE ONLY BLACK Man on the Titanic

Joseph Phillippe Lemercier Laroche & his family

There was a Haitian man on the Titanic


You've seen the movie TITANIC: starring Leonardo DiCaprio, but did you know?  There was a Haitian man on the ship! His uncle was President of Haiti!  Joseph Phillippe Lemercier Laroche was the only black man, a Haitian man, to perish in the Titanic; that's after he saved his wife and kids.

Laroche was born in Cap Haitian, Haiti , on May 26, 1889. In the blockbuster film Titanic, Leonardo DiCaprio's role could have easily been played by a Black man and it would have been historically accurate. In fact, the life story of Haitian native Joseph Philippe Lemercier Laroche is far more intriguing than the movie's lead character, but no one knew of his existence until recently. The silence about the stranger-than-fiction life story of the Titanic's only Black passenger astonishes noted Titanic historian Judith Geller, author of Titanic: Women and Children First, who said, "It is strange that nowhere in the copious 1912 press descriptions of the ship, and the interviews with the survivors was the presence of a Black family among the passengers ever mentioned.” The story of this interracial family was not known until 2000, three years after the movie's release, when the Chicago Museum of Science & Industry and the Titanic Historical Society revealed the information as part of a Titanic exhibit.

Joseph Laroche was born into a powerful family. His uncle, Dessalines M. Cincinnatus Leconte, was the President of Haiti. When Joseph Philippe Lemercier was fifteen, he left Haiti to study engineering in Beauvais , France. Several years later, he met Juliette Lafargue, the 22-year-old daughter of a local wine seller. The two eventually married.

Despite having an engineering degree, Joseph's skin color left him unable to find employment in France. The Laroches decided to return to Haiti and booked second-class reservations on the Titanic. After the ship struck an iceberg, Joseph loaded his wife and children onto a lifeboat and he went down with the ship. His body was never recovered. Shortly before Christmas of that year, Juliette Laroche gave birth to their son, Joseph Laroche Jr. Juliette never remarried.

What do you think?

"Somewhere there's a place holding something, concealing someone, holding your fate, but only waiting for the time." -anon

 
Tyra Banks 3

"A dream doesn't become a reality through magic: it takes sweat, determination, and hard work."
-General Collin Powell


Abena Disroe teaches


“Families gather for the great feast of Karamu on December 31. Karamu may be held at a home, community center, or church. Celebrants enjoy traditional African dishes as well as those featuring ingredients Africans brought to the United States, such as sesame seeds (benne), peanuts (groundnuts), sweet potatoes, collard greens, and spicy sauces.  Especially at Karamu, Kwanzaa is celebrated with red, black, and green. Green is for the fertile land of Africa; black is for the color of the people; and red is the for the blood that is shed in the struggle for freedom.” – Abena Disroe, December 31, 2009

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

The Spiritual Nature of the King Years - Part II

by David R. Tolson

NOTE: As I articulate the Spiritual Nature of the King Years – Pt II, I am aware that I may offend some of my brethren who believe that discussions of race are superfluous in the Church. However, I humbly submit that one cannot properly understand the profound, prophetic nature of the King Years, even 40 years later, without examining his work through the telescope of race. It is not my intention to fan the smoldering cinders of racial animosity that may remain in our society; however, in order to properly understand the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we must understand that race was simply the cloak that was brandished by his distracters to camouflage the larger meaning of his ministry. To those who I may offend, both white and colored, please know that I am simply making an observation about the cruel world that we live in, and lament over our inability and refusal to create a color-blind society.


This is Gettysburg. This is where they fought the Battle of Gettysburg. Men died right here on this field, fightin' the same fight that we're still fightin' amongst ourselves...today (Coach Boone, Remember the Titans).”

I grew up during the period of black awareness in the 1960s and 1970s when black Americans began to witness the results of the long struggle for racial equality. On the one hand, black men and women were enrolling into schools of higher learning at unprecedented levels and holding positions of authority that were unheard of just ten years earlier. However, on the other hand, there was this faction that firmly held that black people needed to become more self-aware of their heritage as descendants of the African continent. And from this mode of thinking emerged the Black Power Movement — a loosely knit group who attempted to nationalize black culture in the United States.

The Black Power Movement’s intentions may have been pure; however, they did not understand that, while white America was reluctantly prepared to remove social barriers to full rights and privileges for blacks, the United States was not ready to integrate black African culture into America’s European culture. Muhammad Ali’s refusal to be inducted into the military during the Vietnam War immediately comes to mind. After the United States charged him with draft evasion, he was stripped of his heavyweight championship and was prohibited from fighting for the next three years. Although Ali’s stand against the war had less to do with the Black Power Movement, he was linked with the movement because of his association with the Nation of Islam and Elijah Muhammad, which at the time was viewed as an anti-American, religious organization. Ali was eventually vindicated in his stand by the Supreme Court, which ruled that he had a constitutional right to refuse entry into the military on conscientious objections.

Another courageous act of self immolation was Olympic medalists Tommie Smith and John Carlos: While standing on the podium in the 1968 Mexican Olympic Games to receive the gold medal and bronze for the 200 meter race, they both bowed their heads and raised their fists in silent protest regarding the injustice that many black Americans faced. There was such outrage to this non-violent symbol of black power that they were stripped of their medals, suspended from their national team and banned from the Olympic Village.

I have often heard promoters of the Black Power Movement and Black Nationalism in a chest-thumping frenzy say, “The white man is afraid of the black man, because we have the power to genetically destroy him.” We can argue the merits of this misguided statement; nevertheless, one thing is for sure, the cadre of men who control the launch codes for more than 50,000 nuclear weapons is not frightened by a black man or his penis. However, there is one type of man that threatens all evil men in power, and this man transcends race, creed and color: he is the man that has no desire for earthly possessions, has no fear of death, opposes the injustice that he witnesses, and walks in sync with the God who created the Heavens and the earth.

This man is the man who is feared, not the black man grabbing his crotch, thumping his chest, declaring that he has a genetic remedy for the ills of society. All great social crusaders who altered the course of civilization were successful because they were so single focused that nothing else beyond their mission mattered. And unfortunately death is usually their consolation prize, because too often they do not live to see the results of their struggle.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. became a threat to those men in power in America, not because he led a successful struggle for civil rights, but because his platform evolved into a struggle against global atrocities. His leadership began to unite other voices of dissent in America at a time when the country was embroiled in a questionable military campaign in Vietnam. The anti-war movement, the labor movement and the Civil Rights Movement began to coalesce under the leadership of Dr. King, and for the first time in history, there was a unified hybrid of voices in this country that opposed America’s foreign policy.

As long as Dr. King and the Civil Rights Movement protested America’s domestic policies that left black Americans on the fringes of society, the ruling class was silent. They saw the struggle for civil rights as a battle that was waged between Dr. King and the “Bull Connors” of the world. However, once his leadership exposed American hypocrisy on a global scale, he became a threat to the self interest of Western society; and for that, he was marked for assassination.

In a society where leisure trumps productivity and hard work, we’re swiftly losing the spiritual awareness that King personified. My friend Mike Way calls our generation, the “tail-gate” generation, where we are more interested in socializing over a barbeque grill and a beer than we are over what our politicians are doing on Capitol Hill. He laments over the fact that we have C-Spans 1, 2 and 3, which run 24 hours per day and provides us with a bird’s-eye-view of the legislation that is destroying our once great nation, yet people are more interested in the Super Bowl, the Rose Bowl, the Kentucky Derby, NASCAR, and the Olympics than they are in the destruction of America by our politicians. I share Mike’s sentiment.

Dr. King gave his life to save the soul of America; however, it has fallen upon us more than 40 years later to continue that struggle. http://urclimbingjacobsladder.blogspot.com/

Fox and Rabbit - Apache/Jicarilla

Fox one day met a Rabbit who was sewing a sack. "What do you intend to do with that sack?" asked he.

"I am making this coat to protect myself from being killed by the hard hail which we are going to have today," replied Rabbit.

"My friend, you know how to make them; give me this coat and make another for yourself."

Rabbit agreed to this, and Fox put on the sack over his head. Rabbit then hung him on a limb and pelted him with stones, while Fox, thinking it was hail striking him, endured the punishment as long as he could, but finally fell nearly dead from the tree, and looked out, to see no signs of hail, but discovered the Rabbit running away. Fox wished to avenge himself by killing Rabbit, and set off in pursuit of him. When overtaken Rabbit was chewing soft gum with which to make spectacles. Fox's curiosity was stronger than his passion for revenge. "What are you making those for?" said he.

"It is going to be very hot, and I am making them to protect my eyes," answered Rabbit.

" Let me have this pair. You know how to make them and can make yourself another pair."

"Very well," said Rabbit, and he put the eye- shields on Fox, who could then see nothing, as the gum was soft and filled his eyes.

Rabbit set fire to the brush all around Fox, who was badly singed in running through it. The gum melted in the fire, and yet remains as the dark rings around his eyes. Fox again started on the trail of Rabbit, with the determination of eating him as soon as he saw him. He found Rabbit sitting beside the opening of a beehive.

"I am going to eat you," said Fox ; "you have tried to kill me."

"You must not kill me," replied Rabbit. "I am teaching these children," and he closed the opening of the hive, so that Fox could not see what was inside. Fox desired very much to see what was In the hive making such a noise.

"If you wish to see, stay here and teach them while I rest. When it is dinner time, strike them with a club," said Rabbit, who then ran away.

Fox patiently awaited the dinner hour, and then struck the hive with such force that he broke into it. The bees poured out and stung him until he rolled in agony. "When I see you again, I will kill you before you can say a word!" declared he, as he started after Rabbit again. Fox tracked the Rabbit to a small hole in the fence around a field of watermelons belonging to a Mexican. The Rabbit had entered to steal, and was angered at sight of the gum figure of a man which the owner of the field had placed beside the path.

"What do you desire from me?" he cried, as he struck at the figure with his forefoot, which stuck fast in the soft gum. He struck at the gum with every foot, and even his head was soon stuck in the gum. Thus Fox found him.

"What are you doing here?" he asked. "They put me in here because I would not eat chicken for them," said Rabbit.  "I will take your place," said Fox ; "I know how to eat chicken."

The Mexican found him in the morning and skinned him, and then let him go, still on the trail of the Rabbit who had so frequently outwitted him.

Frank Russell, Myths of the Jicarilla Apaches, 1898
From Blue Panther Keeper of Stories.

Fox and Wildcat - an Apache story

As soon as his life was restored, Fox went to the Buffalo head, and cut off the long pendent hair, i-yûn-e-pi-ta-ga, beneath its under jaw. Fox took this to a prairie-dog village near at hand, and told the inhabitants that it was the hair of a man, one of that race dreaded by the prairie-dogs because of its attacks upon them, which he had killed. He easily persuaded the prairie-dogs to celebrate his victory with feasting and dancing. With a stone concealed in his hand, he killed all the prairie-dogs as they circled around in the dance. Fox then placed them in a pit, and built a huge fire over them, leaving them to roast while he slept. Nîn-ko-jîn, the Wildcat, came along, and stole all the roasted prairie-dogs while Fox slept, save one at the end of the pit, leaving the tails, which were pulled off.

Fox awoke after some time, and flew into a great rage when he found only the tails left; the solitary dog was thrown over his shoulder in his fit of passion. The gnawings of hunger soon induced him to search for the dog he had thrown away. In the stream close by he thought he saw the roasted body; taking off his clothes, he swam for it, but could not grasp it. Again and again he tried, and finally dove for it until he bumped his nose on the stony bottom. Tired out with his efforts, he laid down upon the bank to rest, and, as he glanced upward, saw the body of the prairie-dog lying among the branches which projected over the water. Fox recovered the coveted morsel, ate it, and set off on the trail of the Wildcat. He found Wildcat asleep under a tree, around which he set a fire. With a few quick strokes he shortened the head, body, and tail of Wildcat, and then pulled out the large intestine and roasted it. Fox then awakened Wildcat, and invited him to eat his (Wildcat's) flesh, but to be careful to save a small piece, and put it back in its place, for he would need it. Fox then left him.

Wildcat followed Fox, intent upon revenge. He found Fox asleep, but instead of shortening that animal's members he lengthened them; the ears were only straightened, but the head, body, and tail were elongated as we see them at the present day. The intestine scene was repeated with the Fox as victim.

From archives of Blue Panther Keeper of Stories


In Honduras and Haiti, the U.S. Rules by Proxy

By Glen Ford
Created 12/01/2009 - 20:14

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
[1]
As the old song goes, “They smile in your face...back- stabbers.” The Obama administration “artfully pursues a policy of smiles and handshakes all around – while undermining democratic forces through proxies whenever the opportunity arises.” Washington reserves its rawest deceits for the small countries of the Americas – like Honduras and Haiti.

“Wherever the U.S. has the power to thwart the democratic process, it does so.”

The Barack Obama presidency was supposed to signal a new era in U.S. foreign policy, including in Latin America, which had turned decisively against George Bush’s blustering, bullying and coup-making. What has emerged under Obama is not a reversal of historic U.S. imperial policies in the Americas, but a cosmetic adjustment.President Obama uses far less warlike language than his predecessor, but he deploys every trick and deceit in the book to maintain U.S. dominance in the region. And like all bullies who have had their noses bloodied, he tries to create fear in the hemisphere by picking on the smaller countries.

For most of the 20th century, Haiti and Honduras were de facto colonies of the United States. Haiti was occupied by the U.S. military for nearly 20 years [2], between 1915 and 1934. Honduras was the original, prototypical “banana republic [3],” ruled by a local oligarchy totally subservient to the United States. Both Haiti and Honduras are prime examples of a U.S. strategy to under-develop its neighbors – a deliberate policy of impoverishment and petty tyranny.

But blatant gunboat diplomacy doesn’t work very well anymore for the United States in most of Latin America, where a popular consensus has been achieved that rejects U.S. hegemony. Recognizing the drawbacks of overt American aggression, President Obama artfully pursues a policy of smiles and handshakes all around – while undermining democratic forces through proxies whenever the opportunity arises.

“What has emerged under Obama is not a reversal of historic U.S. imperial policies in the Americas, but a cosmetic adjustment.”

In Haiti, the U.S. proxy is the United Nations, which took over the job of military occupier from George Bush in 2004, after the Americans sent democratically elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide into exile. Aristide's Lavalas Family party has been suppressed ever since.

In Honduras, the Americans still find it possible to act in the old-fashioned way, through the local oligarchy and its U.S.-dominated military. Back in June, the Honduran military bundled democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya into a plane, made a stop at a U.S. airbase, and sent him into exile in Costa Rica. Zelaya then snuck back into Honduras, living under the protection of the Brazilian embassy.

The U.S., standing virtually alone in the hemisphere and the world, refused to call the removal of President Zelaya a coup, and announced that Washington would recognize the results of last weekend's elections to succeed Zelaya even though they were held under military martial law. Hondurans who opposed the coup had no one to vote for, so of course, the oligarchy's candidate won in a very low turnout [4].

President Aristide's party was last week barred from taking part in legislative elections scheduled for February, in Haiti. The oligarchy-controlle d elections commission claimed the party failed to fill out some forms properly. Back in June, only about ten percent [5] of the people turned out for elections in which Aristide's party was excluded.

These two electoral travesties are the true face of President Obama's policy on democracy in the Americas. Wherever the U.S. has the power to thwart the democratic process, it does so, and then bides its time, waiting for another opportunity to stab its neighbors in the back. For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Glen Ford. On the web, go to www.BlackAgendaRepo rt.com [6].


BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgen daReport. com.
Haiti elections
Honduras elections

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Source URL: http://www.blackage ndareport. com/?q=content/ honduras- and-haiti- us-rules- proxy

Links:

[1] http://media. libsyn.com/ media/blackagend areport/20091202 _gf_HondurasHait i.mp3

[2] http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ United_States_ occupation_ of_Haiti

[3] http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ Banana_republic

[4] http://www.nytimes. com/2009/ 12/01/world/ americas/ 01honduras. html?hp=&pagewanted=print

[5] http://www.haitiact ion.net/News/ HIP/11_26_ 9/11_26_9. html

[6] http://www.BlackAge ndaReport. com/

[7] http://www.addtoany .com/share_ save?linkurl= http://www. blackagendarepor t.com/?q= content/honduras -and-haiti- us-rules- proxy&linkname=In Honduras and Haiti, the U.S. Rules by Proxy





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