By Means Of Which, It Goes On All Fours

THE COVEN

Yee naaldlooshii!

Yee naaldlooshii!

Yee naaldlooshii!

Yee naaldlooshii!

"My children, by means of it, it goes on all fours. That is the mystery of the spell, hidden just under the skin. Yet your bodies will not know this mystery until initiated. It is the incantation itself, true; but yee naaldlooshii is the pattern of the ancient hunter's way of life, walking a state of transformation: the path to power. That is yee naaldlooshii!"

She spoke, horrific parody of a medicine woman, ensconced in a mantle of thousands of white owl feathers finishing with a chaos of open beaks that formed the maw of her headdress; a brown and scarred face further submerged in this maw by the fire-lit shadow of the cave spat those words.

Other figures, moving and not, were gathered around the fire, and along the back walls of the grotto and where the upper vaulting was lined with many deer and elk antlers. From the corner came a wet and hungry sound of ravenous eating.

The twins saw their own shadows play upon the walls below the jagged jumble of antler wood, and so joined them. They had traveled a day and a night on foot to reach this place. Lady-White-Owl continued:

"You look like you could be husband and wife, newlyweds just coming of age, but I see that you are brother and sister. Twins. Entrusted with a sacred gift, sprinkled with the spittle of a curse!" The old woman tapped her staff against the ground four times, which rattled with the skulls of myriad rabbits, voles, and other rodents. She spat on the earth in each of the four indentations the staff had made, then fell suddenly silent.

They saw now the source of the ravenous sounds. A boy of about twelve winters was crouched on a deer hide noisily eating from the remnants of some carcass. His teeth seemed to have been sharpened to points with which he tore gleefully strips of flesh and tendon directly from the rib-bones. He looked up. Munching noises ceased, leaving audible only the crackle of the fire. He pulled his wild black hair from his face to regard the newcomers. He laughed wildly for a short burst, then returned to his meal.

"That is Little Badger," said the Owl, "he eats before his elders. We encourage such things here."

The ample space of the cavern gave way to the play of shadow-figures. Seen as shapes, they appeared numberless; but only a few of those shapes were moving.

A man dressed in wolf's pelt began to play a song on a long bone flute, flashing white under the fang of his forehead, and he played for a female in fox's pelt who was dancing around a sand-painting, casting feathers and shards of bone at it. The man's visage was the same ageless and stony immobility of the village medicine man that the twins knew, the same Elder who had counseled them to travel a day and a night to come to this place..

Sensing, smelling that they were of Two Hearts.

He would never wear a wolf's pelt while he was in the village, going from Hogan to Hogan performing the Healing-Way Chant. To wear the pelt of the predator was forbidden to the settled ones in their ordinary comings and goings. His pupils were wide, consumed the iris.

His bone flute cut through the stillness of the cave like a stone knife severs tendon from joint.

Now, the young woman, fox-pelted, assumed squatting position over the figure in her sand painting (too dimly visible in this lair to be clear) and began defecating on it, making animal noises that moved the open mouth of the headdress into a snarl.

"That is Maiden-Mad-Fox, she knows everything about the sorcery of illness and brewing of love potions; Born-of-Fang here is known to you by another name. He is your teacher, a knower of Ceremonies, teller of The Legend of the People, and keeper of holy plants. Here we possess his shadow, worth more than his whole self. He will be your teacher again."

In the meantime Little Badger, leaving bloody handprints on all he touched, had procured a small hand-drum, which he began to paw and padam dam with palm of hand and a rounded knob of bone, laying down a beat for the flute.

A man of indeterminate age who sat cross-legged before the fire began to sing. His mantle was dark as night but shimmered in the flames, his face was covered in a hide mask, hideous and crude features of something like eyes and a mouth were stitched into the hide with sinew. But his voice sang clear, as if it were in every spot of the cave cohabiting with the tam-tam-tam-tam of Little Badger's hand-drum.

I am Raven-Shine,

Blood in the East;

The Corn-Pollen is Red.

*

I am Raven-Shine,

Corpse in the West;

The Corn-Pollen is Blue.

*

I am Raven-Shine,

Bones in the North;

The Corn-Pollen is White.

*

I am Raven-Shine,

Rot in the South;

The Corn-Pollen is Black.

*

From that the Corpse-Pollen is Made.

From that the Corpse-Pollen will Flower.

The young man stood, took his sister's hand. He spoke, made bold by the air, though he hadn't yet met the eyes of his companions:

"I see a Wolf, a Badger, a Fox, an Owl, and a Raven. But I do not see a Coyote."

"Nor do I see a She-Bear," spoke his sister.

"We are a small gathering of like minds and eager to welcome the dedicated. It looks like you have made your choices. Come then, I will set out the stew and we will eat together."

The twins separated, and sat down among the group while a blanket was set out before them, a large clay pot of bubbling stew just off the fire. It was then by the stench, which was not from the stewed venison, that they knew what those figures were casting motionless shadows in the flicker.

In various sitting and crouching poses, as if joining them for the meal, four cadavers in various stages of dryness or rot were positioned, jellied eyes moistly crying down desiccated cheeks punctured by bone, like tanned hide that could be restitched to articulate its features.

The twins sat cross-legged and breathed deeply putrid waves, filled with hunger after a day's fasting, the pangs deep in the belly surmounting all disgust. Mastering the mask of death like a carrion worm.

"Hozho," spoke at last Born-Of-Fang, "is the holy thing I hymn in the village, supporting the rites of the Medicine Man in telling the legends of winter. It is humanity, harmony, goodness, and alignment. It is the gait of the upright walker, the measure of the standing people. It is the emergence from world to world, and it is the ladder from that emergence pit, the grace of man over beast, and Hogan over savagery of cavern. Hozho. By means of it, it walks on two legs. It goes up: when the waters fill the lower world. When the fires consume it, it rises to the next. As if climbing the ladder out of the opening in the top of the Hogan. When you are of Two Hearts, you are cursed to know the farce of Hozho and how it is not worth the dung that humanity is made from. And so you are holy. Know that the spirit of the Hunter dwells best with the Beast; these settled ones have forgotten that. Emergence is not worth what Submergence is: we will show you what it is to be submerged in the dizziness of the four-legged path. It is the taste of blood on the breath of corpse pollen. Darken that darkness, opening the path to all wonder. Submerged in that fire, submerged in that water, we will show you how to return downwards from the source of Emergence, heart to the earth. You will know how to go on all fours. That is the incantation, that is the spell. Yee naaldlooshii! By means of it, it goes forth four-legged. This mystery will be known in your bodies."

By now, a meaty greasy porridge had been sloshed into a number of clay bowls with a wooden dipper. Maiden-Mad-Fox came to join in the meal, after she had been angrily spitting upon the sand-painting she had earlier defiled.

"You are here," said the old woman, "now eat with good appetite. When you return home, you know what must be done. You will bring a token of it to us, when it is finished."

And so they ate.

***

THE HOGAN

Father was yelling at the younger children again. As he was always yelling at them when he was not beating them. Always fierce when he had gambled away their best hides and turquoise with the old men of the village, playing games of dice and hoops or nuts. Grandmother would scold them for eating before their elders, or making an irreverent noise, and so father would beat them. That is, when grandmother was not thrashing them with her own hand.

Mother did not look on, but wove baskets, or ground maize. As if she did not see or was blind, did not hear or was deaf. She wove baskets and ground maize on the stone of her metote, unheeding. She had not even spoken against it when he had given their youngest son over to slavery to a Ute, all to pay his gambling debts.

And so her cooking was like something unheeding, she was far away when she made it, empty gestures stirred the pot. Thus her food had an empty savor, though they had plenty of rock-salt in the larder.

Food cooked by a rock can satisfy no animal.

"Father," said She-Bear, "why do you not go hunting with my brother and bring us some venison for stew?"

"Hunting, with him?" he scoffed, nearly choking on the smoke from his soapstone pipe, "What good can a little boy like that do on the hunt?"

Coyote-Boy looked his father in the eye:

"I am of age to marry, and have been on many hunts. Besides, the Medicine Man says that a male child retains the angry medicine of Monster-Slayer, twin hero; what can be more useful for seeking game? My teacher also told me the legend of a young boy who resented the birth of a baby brother his mother brought into the world. He was certain he was replaced, and would be killed soon to make way for the new child. His mother had always thrashed and throttled him, calling him hurtful names. So, when alone with the baby in the Hogan one day, he strangled it, taking it afterwards to an animal's den. He watched a family of hungry badgers consume the body of his hated baby brother. He then learned bad medicine, mastering the art of transforming himself into a large and monstrous badger."

"He was of two hearts! A creature like that should be killed." Father puffed two unshaped clouds before setting down his pipe.

"Maybe so," said his son.

"Come boy, show me what you can do on the hunt."

And so they readied themselves, and left in pursuit of game.

***

She-Bear behind with mother and the younger children, singing a song as she grinds maize on the metote, with more vigor than mother.

Seize by the eyes

like an eagle with its talons

the life of your prey,

that is the hunt.

Here I grind corn,

Below the East, White Corn, dawning eastward,

the crown of its head is beautiful--

Below the West, Yellow Corn, sundown afterglowing westward,

the crown of its head is beautiful--

Below the South, Blue Corn, corpse facing southward,

the crown of its head is beautiful--

Below the North, Red Corn, blood flowing northward,

the crown of its head is beautiful--

Here I grind corn;

the body of the

gods that we eat. Same

earth will eat the body

of the Old Woman when it is

her time to go down,

seized by the eyes

like the grip of

the eagle's talon.

"What an animal you are to sing the song in this order!" Grandmother cried out, "Do you not know the colors of east from west?"

Before long, her brother returned.

Father had kept on, he said, in pursuit of a large big-horn sheep that could feed the family for weeks. Coyote-Boy had caught quarry worthy his size, just a small deer for their dinner tonight. Father would be back soon.

A large lumpy hide sack stitched up the side soaked with blood, droplets trickle trailing; a small deer but once roasted, the family agreed it was the best venison they had ever tasted, and where oh where could they get more of such toothsome meatstuffs? The younger children danced after feasting, singing:

Our bellies are full

of the best venison,

Our bellies are full;

Father is not here to scold us,

Father is not here to whip us;

Grandmother's poison tongue, always ready

to lash out and pick us all to pieces,

cannot stop our bellies

from being full

of the best venison.

***

"We will soon wear another skin, dear brother. Yet I must perform my part in this farewell too."

Deep into Night's gaping canyon, bridging the horizon of Dawn.

"Grandmother, come with me to see the first light, and to enjoy sorcery of sunrise which blesses the new firewood for the day. Look me in the eye. Alone with me, under the wings of dawn, teach me your wisdom. How to beat down with your tongue, the rhythm of the hand that teaches respect of our elders, the softened violence that is Hozho. Does the house-god tell you to beat with the front or the back of your hand? Meet my gaze: I will tell you a tale, the Medicine Man told me. Of Raven-Shine, who had no family, no grandmother to tell him stories, who spent his time in the burial grounds, speaking to the dead, embracing their bodies, eating the rodents and vermin that came, hungry for their decaying flesh. Soon he met Lady-White-Owl in the burial grounds, who taught him joy through transformations, learning to predict future events by consuming the bodies of people. This wisdom he told me, shared through the mouths of the dead: that I will reach my glory, when I dance wearing the head of my grandmother."

And so, seizing a stone hatchet set by for dressing meat, She-Bear cut off her grandmother's head; the first blow opened the pipe of her neck, the second blow finished severing the bony part, and the third blow cut through the ribbon of skin that remained.

She picked up the head and awaited the sun.

Coyote-Boy soon joined her, hanging his sack of provisions around his neck and shoulder. They set forth for about a mile or so, to where a ravine met a bubbling streamlet and some greenery of short pine and sagebrush. A vulture formed circles from on high.

She-Bear bathed her body in the creek, while Coyote-Boy was affixing sinew, feather, animal tooth and claw, to Grandmother's head. He took some bone awls and needles from the bag, and began to pierce the tongue, muttering words to break its envenomed spell. As he chanted, blood seeped from the tongue and from the neck.

And She-Bear danced naked before her brother, wearing Grandmother's head for headdress; talisman of dead eyes stared blankly forth, the rhythmic shake of blood-smeared hair, color of dust, all befeathered and clawed. Her brother fingered a shrill melody by bone flute which she punctuated with each step of her bare foot, pounding the earth like a drum. The awkward steps of a strange and halting dance. Each beat of the earthen drum shook droplets, a rivulet, an out-pour of grandmother's blood, which flowed down the naked breasts and loins of She-Bear, running down the earth to the ravine's bubbling steamlet.

I dance, beyond my ancestress where

the Earth is beautiful/

the Earth is beautiful/

the Earth is beautiful/

The soles of its feet, they are beautiful

Its legs, they are beautiful/

Its body, it is beautiful/

Its breast, it is beautiful/

The crown of its head, it is beautiful:

The Earth is beautiful.

***

On the return to the cave: the path to a new skin.

The trail is their step, echoing with sound. The print of beast is silent. Immense paw. Wolf. But bigger. Forward eyes, tracking. Nearby, remain the head and hooves of an elk. Blood on the sand, as if painting an image.

The twins move on. Blessed by a large shadow, skulking, that follows them and does not.

They stop for water, a nearby pine shows the marks of talons, larger than any of raptor of the sky. Nearby, the head and hooves of a fawn in a flower of blood on the sand and brush. Steps past.

Now the trail is steep. Clawmarks on the rock, marking the strength of some unknown beast. Moving past blood on the rocks.

They feel a shadow, as of the huge flutter of nameless wings. A white feather descends.

***

THE COVEN

The mouth of the cavern is more than a figure of speech; it swallows. They are all there. Scent of sage smoke and corpses, thick on the air, cadaverously sweet now to their nostrils, eliciting almost a snarl and a pant. The desire to break bone with your jaw-strength.

Woven blankets and deer-skins had been set out in the center of the cave, torches blazed all about. Smokes and resins in multicolored whorl. Lady-Mad-Fox and Little-Badger were skinning and dressing the heaps of animal flesh their hunt had procured.

Sticky wet, redder than clay, coiled entrails and white of bone; was it the pigment for body paint, or the preparation for a wedding feast? The body of the beast was bone flute and awl, blanket and garment.

Eyes that were not eyes, only socket of skull, like the mouth of a cavern. Dark inside. While the eyes of the magician's blazed, music-makers, Born-Of-Fang, Raven-Shine, filling the firelit smoke with melodies.

The twins were home.

It was Lady-White-Owl who was preparing the peyote tea at the fire.

We welcome you, to the realm of two hearts. We are all here. Drink deeply from the ram's horn in pact. We see your tokens, that you have brought to us the head of your grandmother, and the virile member of your father. You are cut from the source, just as you have cut these parts from their bodies: you are free to descend. Breathe deep the air, buzzing with the flesh of our ancestors' noble decay, settlers of the burial ground in their nocturnal rest, we see though their eyes and speak through their mouths. Drink the tea from the ram's horn, cry out in pleasure from your marriage bed, just as when Coyote won his bride, Changing-Bear-Maiden. You look like husband and wife, newlyweds just coming of age. For your nuptials we will play the music that sounds from the bones of our forebears. Can you hear the buzzing of the flies beneath the fire's crackle? Black God, Haashch’eezhini, animates the Hogan as well as the Coven with his spirit of fire. Peyote's visions insinuated through the body, like the quest of the worm through the cadaver's channels. It is beneath the skin. Why walk when you can crawl? Down on the earth like a baby does, like you did in the days of Origin, is where you go when you are down on all fours, drawing deep the air that carries the message of every direction of Prey, a pulpy and venous horizon where nostril and ocular focal locus meet. Howl! We will go down. Bark at the lunar tides in the center of your eye where you can smell them ripple through the air from the Four Directions! The Upright Walker pulls the skin from the beast where there is no separation from his skin and its hide to wear its new skin sewn to its heart with sacred sinews. If they look You in the eye, then they are under Your power. It is a scattered sand-painting in blood and vomit, regurgitated from the inner beauty of the augury of entrails, a process of digestion. The bitter taste of love. So descend and howl! It happens from within. It pretends to walk upright but carries the seed of of regression in the pit of its belly, a gaping cavern of insatiable appetite, nostrils flare in the intimacy of dust and root, bloodstream of the world. It howls to go down, waits in crouch, in swoop it screeches. Down, go down to the coolest point, against the earthen bosom, to cool the sweat of your love before us in the torchlight's Vision-Quest: by means of it, it goes on all fours. That is the spell. That is the incantation. Yee naaldlooshii is the practice of a way of life in state of transformation along the path to power. Wearing a new skin. That is yee naaldlooshii! We are all here, welcoming you to the realm of two hearts!

***

Dawn and Night are One:

the full moon can be held

in the Eye for a month.

Backwards walkers and reverse talkers,

every syllable was the shadow of a spell. Now

freed at last, like the falling

of a white feather from the wingspan

of the owl. The eyelid cannot

hinder that field of vision known

as vastness, the force of free

flying. Eyes face forward, for

tracking prey. Seen in tones of

red. Horizontally lowly. Seizing by the eyes

like an eagle with its talons

the life of our food ;

that is the hunt.

This is how the Corpse-Pollen is made;

this is how the Corpse-Pollen flowers,

dusting the bridal bed with its

colors.

We run in wild pursuit after

the taste of fear in

the smell of them;

thereby we grow, we range,

we ravage and we rage, not even seeing the blood

on our claws, on the maw of ripping

blade. Cruel as stone. Only the taste

of blood, and the smell of prey. Running

wild, they flee before us, their eyes are held

fixed and frozen in our frightful embrace;

even a glimpse of our paw-print

can ensnare their minds. Form

of Terror, free from time,

defying place. Twin spirits,

here we are, and everywhere.

With the naked wildness,

of children of four winters.

Glitteringly Savage:

even the badger's

ripping claw possesses sight where

the fang of the fox frees

a tongue to lick her wounds.

All-seeing, all-feathered, the fur

and maw of countless teeth,

the white of countless jaws flash under the

carnivore's spell. By means of It,

It goes on all fours. Ravenous,

and ravening, the revels of the All-Beast,

frightful Animus.

From deep below, it walks

the path of the

sky.

The Spirit of the Wolf will never die,

Coyote's Medicine will be forever

a blessing to the Dawn: a

great Vulture, gory fingers

like so many little

tongues and bellies, glutted

on carrion.

When the skin is separated

from the flesh, then the truth

is seen. No lid will ever

shut that

Eye.

In the same Spirit: