There would be coffee and a cast-iron frying pan full of fragrant, freshly cooked fish. He had always said, “Made too much, help yourselves.” She knew he did this on purpose. That whitefish was the most delicious fish she had ever eaten. It was because it was fresh caught. She tried always to cook it like Uncle, rolling it in flour, with only a little salt, frying it slowly in lard. It was never as delicious and crisp as his.
WAITING FOR THE GRACE TO FALL
You say I’m wise, can help you through
I’ve survived, yes that’s true
But I can’t speak
I have no words for you
I’m waiting without waiting
Like the Old Ones do
Waiting for the grace to fall…
You say I have no fear, that’s not quite true
I just don’t have the same fear as you
You cannot know, and I cannot get through
I’m listening without listening, afraid I may not hear
Listening for the grace to fall
Listening for the grace to fall
CHAPTER SIX
“Oh, my God, the meadows!” Leah grabbed Haywire’s arm as they followed another familiar road.
“Easy, you want to dig us out of the ditch? Remember how we got to the trapline from this side?” Haywire was silent for a bit. He said softly, “After you left, I couldn’t go there for two whole years.”
Leah looked sideways at him. There was a lump in her throat. That was happening a whole lot here.
“That must have been hard. You loved that place, your guaranteed grouse hunting ground.”
“Yep, Mom sure missed grouse. Hardly got them after that. She had to get used to rabbits.” They both laughed, remembering Doris sighing, “Ah, this greazy old thing,” her hints as hard as a whetstone; “Sure be nice to cook a nice fat grouse, but no, just this old rabbit…Ach.” She always said that when they came in from the trapline with rabbits.
She’d fried the “greazy” rabbit in her treasured cast-iron pan like fried chicken and they had always enjoyed it noisily. Doris had loved it too but had to make her point. They had laughed about that in private. Sometimes, when Haywire came home with grouse in his pack, saying “Here, Mom, more rabbits,” she would groan and roll her eyes. When he pulled out the birds, already plucked, her eyes would widen, her cheekbones would rise into her gap-toothed smile of pure delight.
“Sonny!” She would praise, in a soft voice, “you plucked it.”
And each time he would reply, “Well, it’s either I do it when it’s still warm, or hear you moan how hard it is to pluck cold.”
Leah had loved watching Doris pinch the feathers off birds. Her fingers like chubby tweezers, with a quick short motion that made a ripping sound when the feathers came out. She could pluck even a large bird clean in a few minutes flat. If the bird was legal, the feathers went into the dump behind the house. If not, they were buried off in the bush. Because, as she would say, “You never know when that Game Warder might come sniffin’ around here.” The Game Warder never showed in all three years Leah was around. Back then, land claims had yet to be settled. Bush Indians lived in fear of being fined for eating traditional foods, the ones on the “protected” list. The Charlies made up other names to call protected species, as if the Game Warder could hear Doris from miles out in the bush, talking about us going for “singers” (swans).
“Oh, my God, Haywire!” Leah’s eyes were wide. That was the look he lived for. The tough city exterior was gone and uncertainty showed a little girl who really did need an old bush Indian.
“This village hasn’t changed at all!”
He smiled.
“Are you sure those Wolf ladies are okay with me helping out with the cooking?” Haywire glanced at her: “Like I said the other three times, and now for all time – yes.” Leah ignored the “all time.”
“Those ladies are all yacking like magpies that you’re coming to help them cook for Uncle’s party.”
Party meant potlatch. Angus was from the Ganaxteidi Crow Clan. Preparation for his last gathering was the Wolf Clan’s cultural obligation. Sacred duty. Right up to the end of the funeral, they would be busy. Arranging and covering tables, setting up chairs in the school gym. The wild-food feast would be ready.
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The Clan leader began to call out in the language, commanding everyone’s attention.
Haywire’s elder cousin, Lorna, leaned to Leah and whispered in her ear. “He is calling on the Ganaxteidi ancestors, so they know Uncle Angus is coming.” Leah knew, but nodded. The calling went on, and the crowd of close to one hundred stood very still, silent, watching, listening. Sun sparkled on snow.
Leah looked to the long-ago fences. Still standing, paint fading, some greyed to bare wood. There were many newer graves, with plastic flowers, strange against the snow. She imagined those flowers in the heat of summer, in rain, fall frost, the deep cold of winter, spring thaw.
The Chinook today felt warm on Leah’s skin. It was good to have wakened in the cabin this morning without the frigid cold.
Leah focused on the words rolling off the tongue of the Speaker. She recognized the words, “Gunałchîsh, Gunałchîsh, Gunałchîsh!” People huddled closer to the grave as the coffin was unloaded with care from the back of Haywire’s truck. The pallbearers stood, respectful.
Lorna whispered, “Walk with the family.” Haywire’s sister, Danielle, hugged her hard and kept her arm around her as they walked through the gate following the casket. The Charlies circled the gaping grave. Leah wondered how the gravediggers had burrowed through the permafrost.
As the Clan leader spoke in English of Angus’s life, Leah wept soundlessly beside the wailing Charlie women. Haywire’s face was down, but he did not cry. He glanced at Leah, then down to the coffin beside the grave. Leah looked at the simple pine box. She knew Haywire had made it with loving hands. There was a design on the top, carved in. She knew it: the view from the old cabin. A wail escaped, unheeded, and she heard it, and then recognized her own voice. Haywire looked at her hard, but she could not stop. All the Charlie women keened and cried, and Leah knew this was the way of it. The women cried for all the men who stood silent. Lorna began to sob as if she were singing, in long wails, up, then down. Leah thought of wolves that had keened the night before, miles off across the lake, in the dark. She had opened the door and walked out to listen. Lorna sounded like those wolves crying up, down, and up slow, and down slow. On and on she sang. When it was over Lorna touched Leah’s arm.
“Come on, Leah. Let’s go change before we head over to the Hall.”
“How could you have known how much being with the family would mean to me?” Leah’s voice trembled. Lorna smiled her gentle smile.
“You are one of us, now. You’ll always be part of the Charlie family.” Leah’s heart kindled with both love and bittersweet memories.
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Lorna whistled when she saw Leah in black suede pants, black suede boots, and a flowing blouse of deep emerald green.
“Well, that oughta get Haywire’s attention!”
At the Hall, a couple of women stood at a welcome table with different-coloured ribbons on tiny pins.
“Crow or Wolf?”
“Both Wolf,” said Lorna, before Leah could answer. They were given pins with blue ribbons to put on. This was new to Leah, but it seemed practical. Not everyone had identifying clan vests or other regalia.
There was laughing, and joshing, tears for the departed loved one were left behind. This was the time to celebrate Uncle Angus’s life. Leah had always treasured this tradition. The whole community sharing the burden of grief and then shifting the family to the joy of remembrance. Lorna led Leah to the Charlie family head table at the front. They passed through a sea of wide smiles, laughter, the shaking of hands, hugs, children chasing one another, the cooing of babies.
On her way back to the head table, Leah looked out at her adopted clan, the Wolf people. My, but they were beaut
iful, tall, proud, fierce. She recognized and stopped to shake hands with “The Singing Cowboy,” Jim Tom, still tall and handsome. Unchanged after all these years. She saw many young faces she did not know but who seemed familiar. Older men still in their long-brimmed ball caps with company labels, wool plaid shirts with jeans or the dark green bush-style pants.
One by one, young people embraced Leah and said their names. It was as if Leah was collecting a basket of gifts from the other side. So many of their parents were gone now. Leah was moved to see children grown up, to know that their late parents still lived through them. To be greeted by them in such a happy and loving way was bittersweet, yet spirit-filling. She had the sweet feeling of belonging. How she had missed this!
The delicious aroma of wild food, plates of bumguts, a treasured delicacy, were being served to the elders. Leah’s mouth watered. She loved them; though some people from “outside” the Yukon turned their noses up at the thought of eating intestines. They didn’t know what they were missing.
Lorna laughed.
“Don’t expect any. Somebody knocked down a moose yesterday, there’s only enough for the old folks at these do’s.”
The Ganaxteidi and other Raven clan members wove between the tables, feeding the elders first, the kids running and laughing – these were all her family. She felt a deep sense of contentment not felt for a long, long time. Lorna smiled: “It’s good to have you here, Leah. You should move back home.”
Haywire settled in on one of the side benches. It felt odd to Leah that he wasn’t with her. With a knowing smirk, he watched his wife make her way toward the head table. His eyes met Leah’s and the smirk was replaced by his gentle boy smile. Haywire’s wife placed plates in front of Leah and Lorna.
“Here you go.” she said. Leah and Lorna looked at each other, incredulous. “Did Lorraine actually just speak to you?” Lorna asked in a hushed voice.
“Where is my cell phone? Gotta call CBC radio.” They both shook with laughter. That good feeling from the belly laugh.
They tucked into full bowls of soup and wild meat. Leah savoured each bite of wild meat, each drop of soup, as more and more food was placed in front of her. She knew protocol well enough not to refuse a thing. She knew she was to take anything she couldn’t eat with her when she left and give it to a Raven family member. They must be famished, surrounded by all this good wild food. Dessert arrived. Moss berries fried in lard with sugar, Indian ice cream, pink and frothy and slightly bittersweet, cakes and pies.
“Oh, oh,” she said to Lorna.
“What, oh oh?”
“I ate too much Indian ice cream and it is foaming up in my belly.”
“Bloated belly is good. Haywire always did like you with meat on your bones.” Lorna giggled breathlessly. Leah always overdid Indian ice cream. She adored the bittersweet tang.
The Speaker called Leah’s name. It was time for her to sing. She rose and walked to the microphone with her guitar in hand.
She stood unspeaking for a moment and looked out across the gathering.
“My name is Leah Red Sky. My mother is Salteaux, and my father was Haudenosaunee and Salish, and Anishinabe. I am also Scots, English, and Spanish way back someplace.” She heard people chuckling. She knew it was a loving unspoken teasing.
“I am a proud adopted member of the Daklaweidi Wolf Clan, through the Charlie family. I am very honoured to be in your traditional territory.
“I have been asked by the family to share a song. It’s called ‘Courage in My Eyes.’ I wrote it for Angus.”
The room was silent. Her eyes were closed. Her voice came like a creek, then a rushing powerful river. Haunting. Nuances of yearning: regret, longing for reunion. The fingers that plucked the strings of her guitar spoke of deep love. It was lyrical, repetitive, hypnotic.
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COURAGE IN MY EYES
Thunder rolling
all across
a crazy sky
star-fires burning
across the
ink blue night
one for
each of us
I know this
but I don’t know why
I am flying
in an ink-blue sky,
with chips of fire
some people call stars
and there are no walls
and there are no barriers,
and I am free
I want to be a warrior
with courage in my eyes
I want to be a warrior
with courage in my eyes
And I will be
a warrior
with courage
in my eyes.
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Leah held silence at the end, as still as prayer. Opening her eyes, she smiled at the Charlie family and walked back to the table, the family members mouthed thanks as she passed. Lorna gave her a one-armed hug.
Dale Post swaggered with a long cowboy stride to the front. and the Speaker introduced him:
“The RCMP is taking over. Dale Post is going to make an event announcement.”
Leah had never seen an event announcement at a funeral potlatch.
There was snickering. No one missed the little RCMP jab. Post did not introduce himself or say where he was from.
Not good, Leah thought to herself. The elders would want to know who his people were. This was very bad manners.
“I want to advertise an upcoming Native comedy event that you will all enjoy. It will be at the Kwanlan Din Cultural Centre in Whitehorse this Saturday at 7 o’clock p.m.”
Lorna winced at the mispronunciation of “Kwanlin Dün.” He name-dropped nationally known Indigenous comics. Leah leaned in to hear Lorna: “May be prettier than me, but he sure is full of himself.” Lorna giggled.
“I wanted to say that the young lady that just sang would be a good person to go to a bar with.” He feigned boxing. Someone in the crowd tittered.
“If she got into a fight, and there were Tlingits there, they would defend her. If there were Scottish people, they would defend her. English people would defend her…” Leah began to shake with anger. This was beyond teasing. He had some of the crowd laughing. She walked out of the Hall. Outside, she breathed in the cool air.
How dare he make fun of a respectful traditional introduction? Four young village men came out, nodded as they passed, walked down the steps and lit smokes. She heard a voice behind her.
“Gonna come and check out my comedy, fine white woman?” Leah circled, facing him as he moved onto the lower steps. The men blew clouds of smoke, half-turned away, trying to be discreet.
“Our people,” she began, “are so beautiful, so talented, so gifted. And then…” – she paused, he waited, smiling, intent – “there’s assholes like you.” His wide smile faded to an angry scowl. The men sniggered, one grinned, saying just loud enough to be heard: “Burn, baby, burn!”
Dale Post stomped across snow-covered gravel to a bright red truck and gunned the engine a little too hard, spinning icy gravel on the way out of the parking lot. The men raised their arms, in mock defence. Leah took a deep breath. Harry Peter smiled at her, winked as he said, “Good to have you back again, Wolf Sister.”
Her anger was replaced by love. These people, their gentle way of edging you back into the circle, it was something she had missed. She walked back to the Hall just as a she saw five small boys standing in a circle at the front, obviously excited. The Hall thundered with drums as the little ones began to dance like wolves, howls possessing them. Leah’s heart rose with the pride that was palpable in the room. If only time could stop, and she could stay within the beauty of this moment forever.
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Coyote is ravenous as he catches a scent on the wind. Spies a huge animal. Attacks. He cannot easily find the neck. He leaps, sinks his teeth into the flank. The cow moose bellows and bucks, Coyote holds on. The moose swings and stamps, turns this way then that to try to loosen the flinging thing that clings, whacks against her side. She bucks and swa
ys, finally smashing the beast against a tree. Coyote, wind knocked out, lets go, stomach growling hard at the taste of blood in his mouth. The cow bolts off, left back flank bleeding. Coyote watches her go, licks blood off his lips and, when he recovers his breath, trots off hunkered low, tail down.
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FIRE AND ICE
I will say your name like a mantra
On my solitary journey through all the worlds
You always run from your shadow
The trouble is that’s the part of you I love
I am like the girl who sees pictures in front of her eyes
To block out a world too cruel and I think that little girl is wise
I never wanted to own you, no, I just wanted to grow old with you
With you
It’s always about saying goodbye, it’s always about love and courage
We are like fire and ice – you burn, I melt
You burn, I melt, you burn, and I melt into nothing
Into nothingness itself
It’s about justice it’s about truth
There is a poverty of soul within me
All I’m left with is your name
And I will say your name
And I will say your name
And I will say your name like a mantra
On my solitary journey through all the worlds
CHAPTER SEVEN
As the plane rose to the sky, she had the feeling she was being pinned to her seat by the pressure.
Haywire had not come to see her off. But looking below as the aircraft circled, she spotted his truck idling in the parking lot, a heat cloud from the exhaust pipe. He had come to say goodbye in the only way he could. Leaving Haywire behind for the second time felt like an amputation.
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Leah blinked the damp from her eyes and focused on a sapphire-blue sky paling to aquamarine melting into opal clouds washed pink and gold from a setting sun. A river valley spirit snaked along black waters. Winter-white mist hung above slate mountains and deep valleys thick with snow. She watched until the dusk swallowed the sky colours. Finally, the coast appeared. Blue-black land, palest blue water at the horizon, like a watercolour. She did not feel ready. At all.
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