Pillars of the Moon

by French, B. J. ;

  Mist slowly rolling over the grass on the opposite bank, gave the area a still, mystical look. The air, in these early days of spring, was still cool at night and the warmth of the morning sun was slow to heat the earth beneath. In the distance, from whence I'd come, a light crown of snow appeared as white lace adorning the high mesas and mountain to the south. The warm temperatures in the lower areas along the riverbeds, were still severe and the small patches of winter wheat had yet to be reaped. From the appearance of the stunted foliage and the shallowness of the river within its banks, the rainy season had not started.

  I knelt precariously balanced on a large, smooth stone and recovered from the shock of splashing the river's coolness over my face. Not noticing the sudden intrusion of the little boy coming up from behind, I slipped off the stone.

  "Good morning."

  He grabbed my wet hand and pulled me back in the direction of the house where his family had spent the night. The uncomfortable, cold water-soaked cloth of my pant leg stuck to my knee.

  Startled by his persuasiveness, I reached for the blanket and played along after him. As we entered the hut and closed the door, I could sense something was amiss. Carlos' wife sat on the cot with her little girl while the little fellow directed me to sit at the wooden table built for the four of them.

  "Hola. Me llamo, uhhh." I stopped short trying to remember my name. Unable to roll it off the tip of my tongue, I smiled at the boy. "Y tu, como te llamos?

  Nothing, he smiled back at me with a huge grin from ear to ear. Asking his name in my broken Spanish wasn't going to work.

  As I looked over to the cot, the woman slowly lifted her finger to her lips in a gesture to quiet me. Within a moment, I heard horse’s hooves and a conversation going on between the visitors and Carlos. Getting up from the table, I crept to the ripped plastic sheeting that covered one of the windows and peered out to see three natives on horseback. Carlos was at the head of the horses keeping them calm while he talked to the riders. Not able to catch a familiar word in any of it, I quietly returned to the table to wait with the others. After a brief conversation that ended in a heated discussion, the three left and Carlos returned to the chores. After several more moments, a knock came to the rear of the hut and the face of Carlos appeared in the back window. He gave me a nod in recognition and after speaking to his wife, the atmosphere lifted slightly and the children began to move about.

  "I will be back soon." he said, and disappeared as quickly as he had come.

  His wife started to move about preparing a breakfast. The children disappeared outside again in loose T-shirts and bare feet. Several times I made a motion to the door but she stopped me short. I would have to wait.

  "Do you speak English," trying to make conversation?

  She smiled shyly and spoke blushingly in her own tongue. We began in sign, as she busied herself with the fire and making dough. Annoyed with my fidgeting, she handed me a knife and I started cutting vegetables and pretending all was normal till I accidently sliced myself. She called her daughter in and once again I was left to fidget. She was very adept at using the small pizza spatula-like pan to flip the flat cooking dough. A golden stack of tortillas began to build quickly. Eventually, the girl and boy took over the cooking while she busily prepared some fish along with various roots.

  Before she was finished, Carlos had returned to beside the oven-pit with an elder adorned with long, flowing, black hair. Unsure whether I was to present myself, I waited inside the threshold of the door. Shortly, Carlos came to the house and took my hand.

  "Good morning," Carlos said with reserve. "We had visitors you should not meet. The Navajo have been looking for travelers on foot heading this way. I told them I had seen no one and that they were on our ancestral land; some do not like to be told."

  The Navajo had come on to transitional land leased from the Hopi. This land has been in dispute for many years with no determination made by the Government. The Hopi had claimed this as their ancestral land defined by the stone records of their migrations and stone markers of a thousand years. Between what they (the Navajo) had taken, and the government has given them, the Hopi are left with a small portion of what their homeland originally was.

  With that, Carlos gathered a shawl-like poncho and put it over my shoulders, and then placed a woven hat over my head to hide my features. Even with a good tan, there was no way I could compare to the almost black complexions of these native farmers. Stooping slightly, I made my way over to the outside oven and sat down as if to eat the morning meal.

  "Good morning." I directed to the old man as I made myself comfortable.

  He nodded in recognition and peered at me from behind deep-set eyes of sparkling coal. His skin was well lined and looked as if he had spent every day of his long life in the sun. He sat across from me and said nothing.

  Throughout the meal, he watched me as I ate and how I handled myself. I was aware that in some cultures to sit across from someone was a great honor and had great spiritual significance. Whether this was one of those instances, I had no idea. The scrutiny felt odd.

  After our breakfast, the old man got to his feet, nodded to Carlos and disappeared up the trail to the high ground beyond. Carlos had always treated me with respect, but after this brief meeting, he seemed to hold me in reverence. Even the children changed in temperament and were more aloof than they had been before. Sitting for a while after, we spoke little and finished the final crumbs of tortillas and fish.

  "We need to travel," Carlos finally said to me. "The man you seek will meet us soon. Too many have seen your arrival and will come to seek you."

  A little startled at his accusation, I stretched my legs out before me. "How do you know this?"

  "The same way I knew where to find you yesterday."

  I thought about it for several minutes and understood that in thousands of square miles of deadly terrain, fissures and canyons there is no such thing as chance meetings.

  "From now on, when we are with my people, you may hear me called 'Morning Moon'." He stood and gathered some cutting utensils and looked toward me. "And what do they call you?"

  I tried once again to think of what my name was, but it did not come. It was somewhere there, illusive, like the details of my past.

  He nodded directly to me, "We will call you 'Ikwatsi', friend."

  Returning his gaze in acknowledgement, I too got to my feet and I headed in the direction of my lodging. Once inside the lean-to, I gathered my boots along with the leather bag stuffed inside. Still unable to adorn my boots, I gave my feet a rub. Removing my clean but discolored, gray socks, I lay back on the hay and wondered about travelling with such feet. The bowl which now lay among the loose strands of grass seemed at that instant less of a problem.

  With thoughts of the three native travelers, a pang of caution came to mind; it would be prudent not to carry the bowl for a while. Reaching for a miniature hoe that leaned against the wall, I cleared a section of dirt from beneath the small haystack; a hole about twelve inches round and deep, and after placing the bowl tightly wrapped in the bag within, I lightly packed the earth over top and replaced the hay. Certain everything looked undisturbed, boots in hand, I ventured from the open structure back to the oven-like heat outside the hut.

  Morning Moon had been speaking with his wife and prepared a few things to go on a trip; the mules were being loaded with bundles and woven baskets. The children ran around excited as if something special were being enacted. The young boy approached me carrying a floppy bundle in his hand. He smiled and dropped a pair of woven sandals at my feet. Smiling and looking down to the ground, I noticed he too had donned sandals of the same design.

  "Thank you." I smiled appreciatively.

  "You're welcome." Astonished at his English, I chased after him a few steps to acknowledge he had fooled me these last few hours. He giggled and ran off to his mother who continued with the preparations.

  Within the hour, Morning Moon’s wife an
d one mule, with the children perched on top, headed up one trail to the south, while we followed the trail of the old man to the east. Traveling at this time of day was not good, but the circumstance deemed it.

  Walking to keep up with my partner, who guided the mule, became quite a chore. Even though the thongs were a great relief for my feet to walk in, Carlos moved as fast up the cliffs as he did on the flats. He had a slight build but was very muscular and obviously fit. There were no 'burger stands' out here to clog your arteries and slow the blood flow. The native diet is fairly simple and nutritious, but with the damming of the Colorado River and some of her tributaries, the nutrient rich flood silts that nurtured their crops were no longer bathing the shores once a year, replenishing the soils. The best farms, save for a precious few, were forced to move from the river valleys to higher ground, to allow for the conversion to hydroelectric dams. Irrigation became a necessity and with the high evaporation rate, an abundance of minerals were left behind causing an imbalance in the fragile, wind and sunbaked soils of the flat-topped mesas. It was a true paradox for the Ministry of the Interior to deal with, but for these soil-dependent First Nations, it has become a travesty.

  Lagging behind after several hours, it became obvious I had not fully recovered from the previous day's ordeal and followed along as best I could. Carlos would turn from time to time to view my progress and was always patient while I labored to keep up. Luckily, the terrain before us was becoming less severe as we traveled east, but the sun was still hot on our backs as we traveled with it setting behind us. Fortunately, the air had remained cool throughout our trek, but knew once the sun had gone down it would be cold. Carlos must have sensed my concern and told me we would stop soon. Within an hour, we made our way down into a tree-ranked valley. We pushed our way through some underbrush and came to a crevice between two high bluffs. Squeezing through behind Carlos and the mule, I was surprised to find a sheltered small, hollow clearing with budding trees scattered about the area. Tamarisk trees and a splattering of light foliage marked a corridor of damp soil that leaked from the opposite side across the clearing’s floor. A crevice, in the stratum several feet up the marble-like-layered wall, was wet and culprit.

  My spirits escalated as my scrutiny brought to life the unique wonders within the obscure confine. A mini ecosystem had evolved within the boundaries of this small enclosure that flourished independent of the harshness outside the small valley. As I found out later, the sun beating down from above warmed the surrounding rock that in turn retained the heat that was slowly released throughout the night. Sheltered from the wind and the elements, this little coppice proved a blessing to all who knew of its whereabouts.

  "This is quite cozy." I commented to Carlos as we gathered wood.

  "Yes, this is a very special spot for our people. It is well hidden and, until today, is visited by no-one but our tribe." He placed a small armful of kindling by an overhang that he had chosen for us to sleep.

  The last golden rays of the sun reflecting off the opposite wall were lighting the sheltered spot. I sat down beside the pile with my back against the warm sandstone wall and watched as Carlos dug in the moist earth in the center of the clearing for roots and whatever else he might find. I knew better than to ask what was to be eaten and accepted whatever was provided. We worked together to get a fire going and within minutes had our dinner of beans and roots cooking away on stones placed in and around the fire.

  "Come with me."

  Carlos led me to the far corner of the clearing, and while there was barely enough light, he showed me a group of wall carvings that looked to be centuries old. I could make out animals and birds, corn stalks with separate cobs of different sizes. People milling about, with feathers and unrecognizable objects in their hands. Circles and spirals heading in different directions, adorned the walls of this obscure niche, sheltered in the walls of an insignificant canyon tucked in the middle of no-where.

  As if to read my thoughts, "For me and my people, this is the center of the universe. We have been coming to this place since the completion of our migration. My people have traveled south, east, west and north and have fathered many nations from the beginning of time. We have always chosen solitude when the creator was no longer reflected in the lives and purpose of those who lived alongside us. We moved on until we were brought to this place, and have gone no further." He looked long at the inscriptions and said no more. We headed back to the fire.

  After the meal, we sat for a while and talked of his children and why he had chosen to live off the reserve. He spoke of a time when the Hopi traveled for days in one direction to come to a place where a village had thrived hundreds of years previous, and was part of their home, but now occupied by foreign people. He spoke in length and signed as best he could to help explain as to why his people had chosen not to embrace our modern culture. In a previous world, lead by a different clan, they had acquired great knowledge and achieved technological heights reflected in their flying machines and medicine, far superior to ours today. It became perverse and was destroyed through greed and power. People now think this nation, adhering to simple ways, is backwards, but in fact they have chosen, by will, not to repeat the mistakes of their past and live to honor and worship the Creator. They still have great power, and will be called upon again to act at a time of travail and a great gathering of 'the people'.

  Burying ourselves, as best we could, with sand leaves and whatever was available, we snuggled down for the night. The glowing embers of the fire lit up the cut back in the cliff as we slept with our backs tight to the wall. I slept surprisingly sound with no disturbance and only vaguely remembered a dream of ribbons of colored lights reflecting on the rippling waters of a bay. The rustling of trees woke the two of us just as the sun was beginning to lighten the sky. As we got to our feet and dusted ourselves off, the old fellow from the breakfast of the day previous sauntered to greet us. He carried nothing and looked eager, and spry, and walked up to me without hesitation.

  "Good morning," he said with a broad grin. It was almost opposite from the previous morning. "I am 'Sees Dawn Rising", he continued without lifting his gaze. "You may call me Don." I nodded in agreement and retreated to the cleft in the damp wall to refresh myself in the small pool on the ledge. It was sweet and cool, hardly like I had thought it would have tasted. Taking another sip, I splashed the water over my face and wiped it dry with my shirt. Carlos and Don were speaking in their own language and offered no conversation in my direction. The two of them seemed lighthearted as they worked away burying any visual remains of our being here the night before. When all was complete. Carlos made his way to the water ledge and refreshed himself as well, then filled the water bag that he had carried all along. Without any words of direction or plans offered my way, we headed toward the opening and squeezed from the vertical fissure out into the country beyond. Don took the lead and we followed in single file, me behind the mule, down the trail to the valley and mesas beyond.

  "We are now entering the lands which the government has given my people as peace offering. We believe it is in retribution for them not being able to mediate on our behalf the lands which were taken from us." There seemed no animosity in Carlos voice and spoke rather matter of fact.

  Continuing on in almost complete silence, we forged through the underbrush in the low areas and climbed undaunted the cliff faces. Looking back after several hours, I tried to place where we had been, and without difficulty was able to recognize an almost straight path, up and down cliffs and along the plains. We had walked as if someone had drawn a straight line. With the sun rising into the morning sky and without anything to eat, I slowly became tired again. My mind began to wander to the images I had seen on the wall the previous night.

  Boredom, and curiosity, got the better of me"Carlos," I shouted to him. "I know that you have sacred sites and the place at which we stayed last night was one, but why was I allowed to see it? I am honored, but why me, and why now?"

&nbs
p; He looked at me strangely as if I had asked an unanswerable question, "Even though you have some Indian blood, no man other than the tribal elders have seen the drawings of my people," he replied. "You are Kachina. You are spirit come to visit us."

  "What do you mean?" I asked, bewildered.

  "You are here in a body, and we see you and you believe you are here, but your spirit is from elsewhere."

  "What!" I replied, trying to understand what he meant. "How do you know?"

  "I don't, but he does," he replied, looking straight ahead to Don.

  It made little sense to me at the time, and only left more questions.

  After some contemplation on what he had said, I found myself confused, but unafraid. I felt no sense of detachment, only a knowing, somewhere within me, that knew of what he spoke. Watching my sandal clad feet, scissoring back and forth in the sand and rock below, for several seconds, I looked at my boots slung over my shoulder with my socks tied through the loops.

  ‘Why am I carrying these’ I questioned the wind? Thinking of no good reason, I slung them behind a boulder out of sight and continued on without a second thought unencumbered.

  Another two hours went by without incident till Don, who walked ten paces in front of us, put up his hand in a motion to stop. Without hesitation, we stopped and stood. His eyes looked far to the east where we could see the great plateau of the third mesa and the location of Oraibi, the town we were presumably going. He made a visual panorama of the east swinging south to the west, and then stopped to watch the distance behind us. Without moving, he stood and watched. Carlos and I turned to watch whatever it was to transpire, but were on slightly lower ground and not able to see until they were almost on top of us.

  Four men on horseback came over the crest of the hill behind us from whence we had come. They all stopped within feet behind us; their horses snorting warm air and mucus from their nostrils on our sun baked necks and hair. The leader directed his horse around us throwing my discarded boots at me as he passed, hitting me in the chest. Recognizing him from the previous day, I could feel my pulse raising and a slight twinge of fear tug at my belly. Able to control it, I watched as he continued on to Don and got down from his horse. The rider walked up to him, and with one motion knocked Don to the ground with a punch and stood over him, yelling. I felt my body tense up and adrenalin course through me. My legs, which coiled ready to spring to action, turned to lead. A hand gripped my arm and gave it a gentle squeeze. At the same time I heard the clicking snap of a rifle being cocked. Motionless, we stood and watched as Don was repeatedly beaten and kicked. He lay motionless and bleeding on the dusty path ten paces before us. Without mounting his horse, the attacker strode back to us, faced us and spit into Carlos face. Punching him in the stomach, Carlos doubled over on his knees. There was no gasp for air but just a moan of exhaustion as he keeled on the ground. Watching for a moment to see whether Carlos would move, the assailant came and stood in front of me to look into my eyes. With disgust, I peered back deep into the coal black eyes and a soul of anger. He rolled his jaw in attempt to procure the moisture to ejaculate when a gasp of inhalation came from beside us.