by Beth Piatote
ANTIKONI
Ismene, ʔáyi,1
We were born into this suffering. That our own blood would be divided
From us, that our mourning could never come to an end, for it can never
Properly begin. Have you heard
The latest decree, that all are forbidden from this place?
Not drum or song or sweetgrass smoke, no prayer may be given
Our Ancestors here.
And what is denied the dead is denied the living ten times again.
We remain the captives with them.
Tell me, ʔáyi, have you heard any news? Do you feel our enemies
Surround us, even those who once called themselves our Friends?
ISMENE
Né·ne’2
There is talk enough to go around. But now I hear nothing, from Friend or foe.
Our status is ever precarious. Nothing has changed. The law
Will speak however it wants.
ANTIKONI
It is in the shadow of this Hall that I called you here alone.
It is in the shadow of this law that I speak.
ISMENE
I fear what I am about to hear.
ANTIKONI
Kreon has made a great purchase for his palace. The warshirt of our
Ancestor, Ataoklas, has been found. Across the ocean it was held, among the
Treasures looted from our motherland. Kreon has bought it and plans to bring it
Back for a great display. A show of the brave Ataoklas, who gave his life for the
State, who killed his own kin for Manifest Dest.
The great warshirt of Ataoklas, along with his bloody áplac,3 is to be storied in
A gleaming vitrine, while his selfsame body disarticulates beneath the floor.
Kreon speaks of honor for Ataoklas, but the blood-pride of nonʔtáq4 runs thin. He honors not Ataoklas, nor our faithful himíyu5 Polynaikas.
By the law of this land we cannot interfere.
We cannot touch the beadwork or leggins
or the bodies
Brought forth by our grandmothers’ labor.
There is a great penalty: prison.
Prison for those who touch the things that truly belong to them, that seek rest
For those who remain tormented.
Surely ʔáyi, you are aware of all of these things. Soon you will have the
Chance to show how you feel, how noble and true you are
To the path of nú·nim titílu.6
ISMENE
Né·ne’, our lives are short and this problem is long. We cannot undo
The designs of five hundred years. Did our Ancestors survive
So that we could throw our lives away?
ANTIKONI
I beg you to be one heart with me. And of the same hand.
ISMENE
What do you intend?
ANTIKONI
I will bring out their bodies. I cannot carry the burdens alone.
ISMENE
You know this cannot be done. Not only Kreon will stop you. The laws
Will stop you. The bodies are ungoverned by us; they are the State’s treasure
And the jealous words of the State will snare you.
ANTIKONI
ʔáyi, ʔikú·yn nú·nim titílu hiwsí·x!7
I cannot betray them.
ISMENE
You will go against nonʔtáq then?
ANTIKONI
Why not once betray the blood who twice betrayed mine? Who is he to stop me?
ISMENE
Né·ne’, tiné·nekse.8
You must hold it in your heart, do not be ruled by a strong head.
Give some thought to our history.
Our father is dead by his own hand, our mother by disease.
Both could not bear their own living flesh.
Our grandfathers and grandmothers were forced to boarding schools, beaten and
assailed by brutes.
Our great-grandparents survived the war,
lived through the Hot Place,
endured Leavenworth,
and prisons filled with children.
Not so many generations back
Our people were slaughtered. Surely you must know
That these rulers have power greater than ours. If we defy the law,
They will make examples of us, punish us.
We are women and have more to lose: our life-giving, our blood. They take away children, they sterilize mothers. These things they have done.
Listen, né·ne’, their power is greater than ours on this land.
(pause)
And it is not only the State who may punish you. But think of our kinsmen
Of other Red Nations. What will you risk of theirs? You may succeed in your
Dangerous quest—you may bring the lost brothers home.
But surely your fate will befall the others. They will be punished as well.
Perhaps more severely—although I fear you risk already your life.
The Tribes will be angry if your stunt closes the door
To all others who pray for their Ancestors’ remains.
Those Tribes who have papers, who are following
The rules as NAGPRA demands. They will lose if you succeed.
Let us work with them, with the path that is there, rather than forge ahead
On a doomed course.
ANTIKONI
We see things differently. You will not join me in this action.
Do what you will, but I will return our Ancestors home, to give peace
To the living and the dead. And I will soon find this peace.
I am ready for it. It is better to die a noble death than to live as a captive,
Though you bear your chains lightly.
I would die with honor for those whose honor I defend.
I will commit this sacred crime, for I am true
To the Order of the world, the eternal laws, set in motion
Long before this time now, this time that will someday end.
ISMENE
I believe in our ways, as you do, but direct action
Against the State is suicide. And for the Tribes there could be consequences.
ANTIKONI
Say what you will. You will see what talk has gotten us in all of these years.
I will not treaty that way—I treat with my actions.
ANTIKONI turns to leave.
ISMENE
Né·ne’, I fear for you.
ANTIKONI
Fear for yourself. You accept this unholy order.
ISMENE
Be quiet in what you do and I will keep your secret.
ANTIKONI
I’d rather you denounced me in public as you do in private.
ISMENE
You are choosing the dead over the living. You would restore the one who
Betrayed us, Ataoklas, who rode out against his own brother.
What do we owe him for that?
He made the Cavalry his kinsmen—let him sleep
uneasily with them.
ANTIKONI
By blood he belongs to us.
ISMENE
It is wrong to be foolish with blood.
ANTIKONI
You declare that you are averse to me and to our Ancestors.
We have chosen sides. I will carry ʔí·nim himíyu9 with me from exile
To our home in the Shadowlands, across the Five Mountains.
At peace there, we will be beyond the reach of our enemies. For this dream
I live and will die.
ANTIKONI leaves.
ISMENE
I cannot stop you on this trial. But I will pray here for you,
As for any warrior away on a quest.
ISMENE leaves. The CHORUS of five Aunties, the counselors of Kreon, enter, wearing wing dresses and moccasins. The leader carries a hand DRUM, which she plays as they enter.
CHORUS
(Drumming stops. Sile
nce.)
AUNTIE #1
Wá·qoʔ titwatísa ná·qc.10
Coyote was going upriver. By chance
He came upon the Gophers, and he taught them
How to roast camas in an underground pit.
They were happy and there was much camas to eat.
One day he told them, I want to get close to the Sun.
So Coyote married the Five Gopher Sisters.
He married them and there he stayed for a while with his in-laws.
Then one day he said to his wives, Make for me a tunnel directly to the Sun,
With holes so I can breathe.
Now the father of Sun, the Old Man, lived there at Sun’s house,
and together they made trouble.
Every time Sun made a kill and brought it home,
The first thing the Old Man would do
is cut off the balls
and eat them raw.
CHORUS
Ohhhh . . .
AUNTIE #1
Now Coyote was getting close to Sun’s house
When suddenly:
There was Sun!
And Coyote called out, Little Brother!
Sun was surprised, because his back was turned.
Coyote said again, Little Brother,
You are sitting in the wrong direction. You are sitting up here to ambush.
Over here is where our fathers—my father and your father—used to go,
Way back when. There’s a firepit over here somewhere.
Coyote took Sun and said, Right here it is!
Surely here was their fire; here are arrowheads and things.
Coyote quickly dug a hole and pulled out an arrowhead.
And Sun believed: Yes, surely! he said.
From Earth’s very beginning it was like this,
And this is how it always was.
Coyote says to Sun, Now let’s chase each other, Little Brother.
Coyote used magic to make water pour from a spring.
Then he said to the Sun, Let’s give ourselves a drink. You first, Little Brother.
Now Sun put down his war club, and Coyote said to him,
Stop, stop, Little Brother.
Let’s do as our fathers used to do—my father and your father—they would hold their war clubs for each other.
And Coyote held the war club for Sun.
Sun put his head in the water to drink,
and Coyote knocked him out.
Coyote beat him,
And then Sun dropped dead.
Coyote loaded Sun on his back and carried him home.
Coyote traded his clothes with Sun;
he dressed himself in Sun’s clothes.
He used magic on himself, saying:
Exactly like Sun I will become.
And that way Coyote, dressed as Sun, carried Sun home.
He carried Sun to his father. First thing:
The father cut off the balls and ate them raw.
The Old Man said,
That sure was kind of bitter.
Always the father would eat like that, and then they would go to bed.
Outside of their tipi
A terrible thing!
A leftover skull placed in a circle.
That Old Man had all the remains they had killed
With their skulls there in a circle.
Coyote felt uneasy.
He lay there, quietly, and soon it became night.
When the Old Man began to snore, Coyote thought to himself,
Ah, yes, now I will leave him.
Then Coyote readied himself and traveled huuuuu . . . a great distance, all night.
As dawn arrived, he thought:
Now I am far away. Right here I will take a nap.
When he woke,
Coyote was right back where he started.
Now the Old Man came out and saw Coyote dressed as his Son.
He says, Why, my Son, are you out here sleeping on the dancing grounds?
(pause)
Then the Old Man says, Yes, my little one,
now surely I feel death close by.
Thus it went—second night,
third night,
fourth night,
to the fifth night.
Every night
Coyote would travel long, take a nap, and wake up to find himself
back at the Old Man’s doorstep.
Coyote made a plan: Just as soon as he goes to sleep,
Then I will cut off his head. That is the only way I could leave him.
And that very thing Coyote did.
He cut off the Old Man’s head.
When he finished cutting it off, then he said to Sun:
You must be separated.
Of you it will be said: This is the light of the daytime.
You will walk across the sky, and never again will you kill.
In the same way, the Old Man will be the light of the nighttime. This one will walk across the sky
and never again eat anything raw.
The humans are coming soon.
They are already coming this way.
That’s all.
FIRST EPISODE/SCENE II
KREON enters alone.
KREON
My Elders, my Aunties. Our house that was once teeming with thieves
Is now under our keep once again. I ask to speak privately with you,
Honored counselors in domestic affairs, wise guardians
Of our domestic dependent nations.
I have ascended most humbly to this rank of power
As trusted interpreter of days gone by—bloody battles and tales of valor,
Treacherous acts and land redeemed—such are my stories.
The State sees me its pet, just as I would have it.
Never would it countenance an Indian otherwise. Think upon our warrior-chiefs: Geronimo,
Sitting Bull, Captain Jack, Joseph.
Imprisoned and tortured they were, in those days.
I have learned from their losses
To smile at my bosses
And hold an unforked tongue.
My Aunties, your Nephew asks most humbly for blessing
As I fill this great house with glorious treasure: beadwork, baskets, sealskin boats.
I speak the Great Law of Peace, Squanto’s desire,
and all the brave deeds of dying braves
Who gave up their blood for Democracy.
Recently I’ve made a most significant acquisition. The full regalia of the famed Ataoklas,
the great Crow warrior
Who rode out against the Hostiles.
I have brought it home.
Soon I will tell his story as it has never before been told.
Our house will be filled with glory. His name will be spoken with awe
And gratitude and honor. For surely he made great sacrifice
To kill his own for the greater Good and security of our homeland.
Our Titó·qan11 will continue, and we will live in the land of our fathers
Because we make kinship with our countrymen, the Conquerors,
And promise them no harm. I find myself in excellent position
To promote this message most widely. Of course, my Aunties, I open my hand
To my Red brothers and sisters who follow the law of the land.
It will go easier for them, to have a brother-interpreter. I can make
A great show of their returns, their ceremonies, of all that is human,
All that remains. But those who would be rash—those who hold vigil,
Who plot to take this treasure, who turn to guerilla means—those are the ones
I must deny.
They are not my kin who would violate the hard-fought laws,
And I will turn on them to preserve this house.
My Aunties, you see my heart is with my People
And my eye is on the State.
AUNTIE #3
The one who calls himself Neph
ew
Speaks as Lawyer’s child, as one
Who would sign a fraudulent treaty for All.
CHORUS
The laws you call upon
Will govern the living as the dead.
KREON
Your blessing then, my Aunties?
CHORUS
(silence)
KREON
Our holdings are under guard. I am secure in what I do.
AUNTIE #3
Many things the white man has done
The Indian has done to his own.
KREON
Arrows from behind, I know. But do not incite a war against me.
Hesitantly, a GUARD approaches from behind the museum doors.
GUARD
Sir, Director, I’ve come as quickly as I could
Given the fact that I bring a message
That I’ve been in no rush to deliver, knowing
That hardly worse news could be brought
By foot or by text or by tongue. At various times
Both feet and tongue tried to go other ways, and
Were it not for my honor-bound duty, not to mention
My contractual obligation through the International Organization of Museum Guards
and Employees Union,
I surely would not stand before you today
Bearing the news of unbearable consequence.
KREON
And what news is that?
GUARD