The Moon of Letting Go

by Richard Van Camp

  Me? I don’t think I have too many secrets. Every five years I spill the beans to somebody about something, I’m sure, but I live a good life: I’m not out to hurt or take. The only secrets I have are my PIN numbers and the love songs that I sing into the wind for someone I haven’t even met yet, but I know I will meet one day.

  love

  Wolf Medicine: A Ceremony of You…

  I have prayed you away for years but you’ve always come back stronger. It’s in the way you laugh, the way you look at me, the way you suddenly become still when I tell stories, the way the world opens up for us when we’re together. I should have listened to my own stories: sometimes when you pray for the Creator to keep someone away from you, He moves them into the middle of your heart. But this is what I want and it’s time to tell you everything.

  • • •

  I was surrounded by fire a long time ago. My grandfather spoke to me as he was dying. He said that his father told him a story. It went like this.

  One winter afternoon my great-grandfather was out in the barrenlands hunting caribou. He was on his dog sleigh. As the dog team raced across the snow towards a bluff, they saw hundreds of caribou running towards them. To his surprise, his dogs raced away from the approaching herd. This was not their nature: the dogs were trained to run towards a herd so the musher could shoot as he rode.

  But they turned away and were crying, screaming. He tried to whip the air around their ears to steer them towards the herd but they ran away as fast as they could. Oh the sounds they made were pitiful.

  As my great-grandfather turned to watch the approaching caribou, he saw that they were not caribou: they were wolves, hundreds of wolves: tundra wolves, woodland wolves—wolves of silver, grey and black. Wolves of all shapes and sizes. They ran right past him and his team. They ran as if a fire chased them. His dogs all froze, crouching, bracing for attack, yet the wolves ran past them. My great-grandfather could only watch in awe.

  As the last wolf passed them, he stopped. The wolf looked at my great-grandfather and told him two things.

  The wolf told him of a ceremony that all the animals honoured for four days in the spring every year in the barrenlands. Each society met up there and spoke for four days: they spoke about what was coming in the wind, about their hardships, their joys, their families, their people. The others listened. And for four days there was no killing, only sharing. After that, the winged ones and the four-leggeds all raced back to their territories to resume the cycle of life for another year.

  Then the wolf told my great-grandfather that he was watching the end of the four day ceremony for that year, and now that the wolf had locked eyes with a man to tell him this, the ceremony was broken: because a man knew what he was seeing now, the animals would not meet again this way, and this was a gift from the wolf people to our family, to make us stronger, to heal others, and that each time the animals give themselves to the people for medicine, all the animals suffer in sacrifice.

  “You,” my grandfather said to me, “have always been special. It was shown to me in a dream that when you choose your wife and have a child, the animals will meet again in the spring after your child is born. You will only have one. And your child will walk with the wolves. Your child will be a healer of healers and will not only work to unite the world but will also bring back the ceremony for the animals.”

  “Bring it back,” Grandpa said. “The wolves in my dreams have asked you to find your mate, start your family, and call the world back into ceremony. We are in another world war. There’s no caribou to be found. The oolichan have stopped running.

  It’s time.”

  • • •

  I wanted to tell you all this, but that was the day you told me you were engaged. You looked so happy when you told me you could not imagine your life without him. I bit my tongue bloody when you told me about your wedding plans. I did not want to take away from your happiness, and the voices spoke: Let her go, the voices said. Be stronger for her when she returns. You are needed elsewhere now….

  I think of those eyes of that last wolf and think of mine the night you got married as I put my fist through a window.

  I told you something else about the scars on my fist but I was miserable for years after he took you away from me. I decided to be an ally for you and your husband rather than bring deception into your home. I did my best to meet your husband in a good way and become a friend, but I aged when I shook his hand, was weakened in the bones and lungs when I saw the way you looked at him in your home. I now understand how a cat can cripple someone who is working with bear medicine. I felt like a pipe carrier beginning a ceremony only to feel the crushing power of a woman on her moon—and it being too damn late to stop what had already begun.

  I slept for a year after you married him, confused. How could this be? In my dreams it was always you. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe the wolves were wrong. This was the power I wanted to share with you.

  Let her go, they said. Be stronger for her when she returns. You are needed elsewhere now….

  That’s all I had to go on, so I vanished into the world as

  a helper.

  • • •

  I knew what my grandfather meant when he said I was special. When I was a child we were caught in a blizzard out on the land and made our way to see an old trapper and his wife holed up in their log house. I was about four. We barely made it before the wind and the snow struck the land hard. It had been so cold for so long that many of the trapper’s huskies had died, and he let the others stay in the back porch where it was heated.

  “No matter what,” the old timer said, “don’t let your son go in that back room. Those dogs are mean.”

  The wind howled outside around us as we sipped tea and ate dry caribou meat. I was four and curious. This was the first time I heard the voices: Go to them, they said. Go see the dogs. I looked around, thinking the adults could hear this. But they were laughing away, telling stories, sipping their tea. Go to them, the voices said. Trust us.

  As my parents got into their visiting, I asked to go to the bathroom. I was shown where to go and made my way, past the bathroom, down the hall. As I made my way towards them, I wanted to see the dogs. Behind the door, the voices said. They’re waiting for you.

  It was like being guided by many hands. I walked into the porch and they were sleeping. Oh I could smell them: earthy and luxuriant. Go to the leader, the voices said. Show him who you are. My heart was pounding as I shut the door behind me and walked through them towards the leader. He was different. I could tell he was mostly wolf. This one has spirit eyes, the voices said. He can see what the others can’t.

  I walked though the sleeping huskies, made my way quietly past them and held my hand out until I touched the leader’s nose. At that, he jumped up with a start—terrified by the insult. The other huskies surrounded me, giving low throaty growls to each other to kill, but I wasn’t scared. I peeled my lips back to reveal my own teeth and flicked my tongue along them, radiating with power, and I let out a growl from under my tongue that made them back away, tails between their legs, ears back, crouched. When the adults found me, the huskies and the wolf leader were bowing to me, and I was smiling….

  That was the day seven wolves surrounded me and began to guide my life.

  • • •

  I danced for joy when I heard your husband cheated on you. I danced. I prayed. I sang. I jigged in the rain. I jigged in the snow. I jigged in the middle of my street at four in the morning because I knew you were free.

  And now here we are: in Vancouver and free....

  But I don’t want to be just friends any more. I want to be lovers. I want us to claim Vancouver and all of her territory as our own. I want our son to know this place, these great people, the mountains, the ocean, the land.

  I have prayed about this, and this ceremony of you came to me in a dream. Years of training on the hill, seeing my sisters through c
ancer, gaining strength to face the circle of Tlicho elders, helping the people, living for others, becoming a road man—all of this was done to put you out of my mind, but you’re free now and we can be together. This is our time and I’m strong enough to hold you in a good way. This is our time now, but we have to be careful because I don’t want to lose what we have. It’s time to welcome you to your home in me.

  This is what our wolves showed me:

  Let’s meet at JJ Beans on Main and 14th. We can have coffee. You need to look into my eyes so you see that I can be trusted with your life. Wolf medicine is the only way to build on what we have and for me to welcome you into my heart as my mate.

  Let us meet in a new way. Please bring me a pouch of tobacco; Red Man is best as it was my grandfather’s favourite. Please bring me a piece of your favourite clothing, as well, unwashed. It has to hold your scent, your memory….

  After, when it’s dark, we will go back to my place. I will shower first. You are welcome to look around. I’m sure you will see the picture of my grandparents sitting together. Look into their eyes: see the majesty. Do your very best to open yourself into the wisdom they see, even from the other side. They asked about you before they passed. They looked away when I told them you were married because they could see the tears in my eyes. They said they would pray for you and maybe they did. Maybe they prayed you back to me.

  On this first night, you can put on any music you like. You are welcome to bring your own. Then you will shower. You must be careful not to wash your hair. We can’t lose your scent. Please don’t wear any perfume. I don’t want you to wash your hair the morning or day you see me.

  I will lie down in my bed first, under the blankets. Don’t worry: I’ll have a T-shirt and underwear on. After you shower, you will come into my room and you should wear a T-shirt.

  You will lie on the right side of the bed. I will lie on the left. Come into my arms. The way I will hold you is I will lie on my left facing you. You will lie on your right facing me. Come into me and let me work wolf medicine on you.

  I’m going to start by kissing your forehead and your temples. I’m going to then smell the very top of your head and your temples, for this is where your scent is. I’m going to inhale you deep so I can see your secrets. This is how I’ll see you as a little girl. I’m going to drink in the images that I see. I’m going to see you with hope in your eyes, waiting, waiting for me to come pick you up, getting ready for a dance, eating with your family. You won’t be able to hide much from me so don’t even try. Words won’t matter anymore when I have you like this and, soon, I’ll see everything. I’ll watch how you’ve seen me grow as a man, and I will see what I have to change in myself to become more than I’ve ever been to you before.

  This is how wolves dream when they choose their mates and I want to do this with and for you. It’s important that your hands don’t wander because if they do, the ceremony will be broken. Let’s get over the temptation to make love just yet. Please respect me about this.

  I’m allowed to kiss you, but you cannot kiss me. Your job is to be honoured, nuzzled and kissed. If you kiss back or caress, you’ll fall into the role you’ve been playing and I’ll be like every other lover who’s been there before me. Let’s not do that.

  I want to inhale you.

  I’m going to caress you and I’ll keep my hands in the PG zones: small of your back, your shoulders, your neck. Again, I’m allowed to kiss you but you can’t kiss back. If you kiss back, the circle will break.

  We are going to do this for four nights. Each morning we will watch the sunrise and you will tell me everything you remember about your dreams. Don’t leave anything out. The wolves who guide me will have listened and whispered to us during our sleep.

  I’ll need each of these four days for myself. I’m going to drop tobacco in the places throughout the city that hold neezee inkwo—good medicine—for us. The wolves will have shown me all of these places in my dreams. I’m going to spend my days praying and sensing what to do next, rolling your dreams and answers through my mind, thinking, seeing. I’m going to be praying about you and your life and I’m going to sleep and dream like my grandfather and great-grandfather. Your favourite piece of clothing will be under my pillow, tucked into my pillowcase, and your world will be revealed to me through the spirit of it when

  I dream.

  If you hear drums while you are at work or smell the earth, wood smoke or mint around you, don’t worry: that’s me praying for you. Welcome it. Welcome everything that comes your way. All I ask is you go to the ocean for at least an hour every day and listen to what your blood tells you. Then, I want you to make a fire. I want you to cook a feast for seven wolves and my family. I want you to burn it all. This is what we call feeding the fire. I also want you to burn two plugs of Old Man chewing tobacco for my grandparents. As you do this, your ancestors will meet mine. I ask that you do this on the first day.

  There is a yellow dog with red eyes waiting for you on the corner of Gore and East Cordova. On the second day I want you to go to him and look into those red eyes. Bring him tobacco. Lay it before him and pray. Pray for our future. Pray for our son. Speak all you are asking for out loud in me so the spirits can help you. You can share with me what you wish when you come back later that evening.

  On the third day, feed the fire for your family. You will have a fever. This is because you are now becoming more spirit

  than human.

  On the fourth day, feed the fire for us. By now, you should hear whispers around you faintly. Your sense of smell will be heightened and you’re going to sense things far more easily. Trust everything that you feel. If the earth wants to, let her take you alive. I can wait until you return.

  It’s your job to fall asleep in my arms. If I wake you up in the middle of the night, you’re to let me kiss the back of your neck and place my leg between yours as we spoon. No matter what happens, we are not to make love. If I wish to kiss or breathe against your neck, you are not to give in. It’s when you feel the feathers or the soft fur move against you that you can’t open your eyes. This is when I need you to trust me the most because that’s when I’ll pass on your wolf medicine. Three of the wolves who guide me have called your name. They’ve asked me to come to you as a gift.

  • • •

  There was a hunter who once saw my grandparents walking together, though my grandmother was walking with a tundra wolf, caressing the fur on his back as they walked. I want you to know this kind of magic again … the way you used to … when we were kids and still believed in the possibilities of the world.

  • • •

  For four nights we are going to honour you and all you’ve been through. Let your scent and the memory in your blood show me what happened along your trail of light. I’m going to travel through your life and braid your scars with ribbons of light. Every place you’ve left your spirit, I’m going to gather it for you. Every person who ever harmed you will be dealt with, and any approaching sickness will be burned away….

  For four nights we will do this. If I have questions, I want you to think very carefully about the answers. Your instinct will be to answer quickly, but I want you to give yourself permission to take as long as you need to. If you need a day or two to think about your response, that’s fine. Your job is to answer honestly—maybe honestly for the first time to anyone.

  You are welcome to ask me questions on the sunrise of our new life together. I am willing to take the chance of losing you as a friend and welcoming you back as a mate for life, and this is the way I was shown to do it. All this for the girl who told me she invented horses before she kissed me for the very first time. All this for the girl who skated into my heart at fourteen. All this for the only woman I was ever born for.

  Let’s make medicine for the world through our love.

  It’s time to raise a healer of healers and put the world back into ceremony.

 
Come into the heart of me

  and let’s make this city ours to roam,

  for each other

  for our family

  for the world….

  Idioglossia

  U,

  Currently reading: Forbes 400 Richest (for our burial suits), Spin (though thoroughly disappointed with their articles on Radiohead and PJ Harvey as they were way too short and lacking anything important) and stories of non-consent.

  Last poem written:

  Watching you with the bloody eyes of a dog. Pornography is about force and I need all the force I can get. The intimacy of shame … God I love it…. Let your cum motor roar, baby, and come screaming clear….

  Saddest realization: I know that the antibiotics stain my teeth yellow and stain yours white while antidepressants make me gain while you lose weight. The Interferon helped you quit smoking and took the hair off your ass, while it left me tired all the time and full of regret (so unfair).

  Latest regret: Should not have turned on the light to find the Thai beads as it scared Tina and Rena into leaving. They had no idea our bodies were so wasted and starving (mostly mine). Plus, when we were in London, we should have ordered our driver to pull over and take us to the Touch Museum (Museum for the Blind, remember?).

  In this spoken moment: I speak but am unspoken to, have the wrong sometimes chemicals inside me (between 3 pm and 4 am), still have painful bouts thinking about the pinkest and softest

  in duplicities.

  What I remember most about Ocho Rios: Our Jamaican bodyguard’s back. It looked like the face of a vampire bat, so heavily muscled and cut. I was so proud of him and thought that I, at the time, was pleased with his work.

  Top or Bottom? Behind.

  Fashion sense? Leather’s out. Love’s in. A man is not complete without a belt. Dreadlocks look like dog hair, and we detest hemp.