Out of love for this earth
cottonwood
sandstone
and sky.
She had been with him
only once.
His eyes (the light in them had blinded her)
so she had never seen him
only his eyes
and she did not know how to find him
except by the cottonwood tree.
“In a canyon of cloudy sky stone,”
he told her (he was describing the Sun House then
but she did not know that)
“Colors—
more colors than the sun has
You will know that way,
you will know.”
“But what if
the colors have faded
the leaves fallen already and scattered
the tree lost among all the others
their pale branches bare
How then will I find you?”
She had to outrun the long night
its freezing
approaching steadily
She had to find the place
before the winter constellations
closed around the sky forever
before the last chill silenced the earth.
“Kochininako, Yellow Woman, welcome,”
and he came out from the southeast to greet her.
He came out of the Sun House again.
And so the earth continued
as it has since that time.
Cottonwood,
cottonwood.
So much depends
upon one in the great canyon.
Cottonwood Part Two: Buffalo Story
In those days
sometimes the people didn’t have very much meat.
When it got dry
the deer went too high on the mountains
and the people only had a little rabbit meat
if they were lucky.
When it got so dry
nothing was growing
none of the plants
and there was no corn
or beans
they would be hungry then
the children would cry
but still there was nothing to eat
no food.
It was one of those times
one of those times when
there had been no rain for months
and everything was drying up.
It was at this time
long ago
Kochininako, Yellow Woman went searching
for water to carry back to her family.
She went first to the spring
near the village
but the water had dried up
the earth there
wasn’t even damp when she touched it.
So she had to walk farther
much farther toward the east
looking for water.
And finally
when she had gone a long distance to the east
she found a pool at a sharp curve
in an arroyo.
But when she got to that pool
the water was churning and muddy.
She was afraid
because she knew something had just been there
something very large had muddied the water.
And just as she turned to hurry away
because she didn’t want to find out
what giant animal had been there
she saw him.
She saw him tying his leggings
drops of water were still shining on his chest.
He was very good to look at
and she kept looking at him
because she had never seen anyone like him.
It was Buffalo Man who was very beautiful.
“Come with me,”
he said, and he smiled at her.
“No, I must carry this water back home.
My family needs this water,” she said
but she was still looking
at him.
“You shouldn’t have gone so far away
from your village,”
he said
“Because now you are here
and this is where we are—
the Buffalo People.”
So he grabbed her
and he put her on his back
and carried her away.
They went very fast
and she couldn’t escape him.
Back at home
they started to worry
because she always came back right away
and they wondered what happened.
Her husband Estoy-eh-muut, Arrowboy
waited all night for her
he sat on the east edge of the village
and watched for her
but she did not come.
Right before dawn
the Big Star
the Morning Star came and said to him,
“Ahmoo’uut, you are looking for Kochininako.
Well, I saw her this morning
as I came up from the East.
Buffalo Man has taken her over there.”
So Estoy-eh-muut went to find Spider Woman
because she knew many things
and maybe she could help him.
She was sitting in her place
at the base of a bee weed plant.
When she saw him she said,
“Ahmoo’uut, grandson, how are things?”
And Estoy-eh-muut said,
“Oh Grandmother
the Big Star told me
Buffalo Man has taken Kochininako.
He has taken her away to the East country.”
“My, my,” old Spider Woman said
“Now Grandson, don’t worry.
I have something that will help you.”
Then she gave him
a buckskin pouch
full of red clay dust.
“Those Buffalo People
will not easily give her up.
They’ll chase after you
and try to trample you.
And when they do
you take this dust
and throw it in their eyes.”
So he gave her sweet corn pollen
and he thanked her for her help
and he started traveling East.
He went a long distance
and finally he came to the wide plains
where the buffalo grass was growing
as high as his chest.
Off in the distance
he could see the Buffalo People
and there were four big bull buffalo
standing guard.
Estoy-eh-muut crawled very carefully
through the tall grass
and when he got close enough
he threw the red clay dust
and he blinded each one of the buffalo guards.
As fast as he could
he found Kochininako.
She was sleeping in the tall grass
some distance from the buffalo.
“Hurry!” he told her,
Run as fast as you can!”
She seemed to
get up a little slowly
but he didn’t think much of it then.
He took her hand
and they started running
because by this time
the Buffalo People knew what had happened
and they were looking for them,
in a big herd the Buffalo People
were chasing after them.
Buffalo Man sent hail storms
in big clouds
trying to slow them down
but Estoy-eh-muut blew the red clay dust
at the hail storm clouds
and stopped them.
Finally Estoy-eh-muut noticed
that Kochininako was running slower and slower
so they stopped to rest
at a cottonwood tree
growing by itself
on the plains.
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About that time
Estoy-eh-muut saw a big cloud of dust
raised by the buffalo feet
and he knew they were coming
so he and Kochininako climbed the cottonwood tree.
Very soon the buffalo came
one after another
they galloped
right under the cottonwood tree.
The very last one
was a young buffalo calf
who was tiring from the long chase.
He stopped under the cottonwood tree
to rest.
Her urine sprinkled down on his back
and the buffalo calf looked up
and he called to the others
“Come back! Come back!
Our sister-in-law is here
sitting up in this tree.”
The buffaloes turned and came running back.
They stood around the tree in a big circle
and Buffalo Man lowered his head
and went running at the cottonwood tree.
He was going to butt down the tree
and get Estoy-eh-muut and Kochininako.
But just as Buffalo Man was running at the tree
Estoy-eh-muut shot him with an arrow
and Buffalo Man fell dead.
Then Estoy-eh-muut killed all the others—
all those buffalo standing around the tree
he shot them with his bow and arrows.
“Go home,” he told Kochininako.
“Go home and tell the people to come.
Now we have plenty of meat
and no one will be hungry anymore.
Go tell them to come.”
But Kochininako
wouldn’t come down
out of that cottonwood tree
He saw she had tears in her eyes.
“What’s wrong?
Why are you crying,” he asked her.
“Because you killed them,”
she said.
“I suppose you love them,”
Estoy-eh-muut said,
“and you want to stay with them.”
And Kochininako nodded her head
and then he killed her too
and he carried her body to her sisters
and they went with him to their father.
When their father saw that Kochininako was dead
he started crying and shaking his head
and calling her name
Estoy-eh-muut told him
“I killed her
because she wanted to stay with the Buffalo People
she wanted to go with them
and now she is with them.”
The old man, her father, cried
“A’moo-ooh Kochininako
A’moo-ooh, my daughter.
You have gone away with them!”
Then they all left the village
all the people went toward the East
and they found the cottonwood tree
where all the dead buffalo were lying.
They cut up the meat and dried it—
they made buffalo jerky
and they carried it home.
This meat lasted them a long time.
So that was the beginning—
the hunters would travel
far away to plains in the East
where the Buffalo People lived
and they would bring home
all that good meat.
Nobody would be hungry then.
It was all because
one time long ago
our daughter, our sister Kochininako
went away with them.
The Time We Climbed Snake Mountain
Seeing good places
for my hands
I grab the warm parts of the cliff
and I feel the mountain as I climb.
Somewhere around here
yellow spotted snake is sleeping on his rock
in the sun.
So
please, I tell them
watch out,
don’t step on the spotted yellow snake
he lives here.
The mountain is his.
When I was thirteen I carried an old .30-30 we borrowed from George Pearl. It was an old Winchester that had a steel ring on its side to secure it in a saddle scabbard. It was heavy and hurt my shoulder when I fired it and it seemed even louder than my father’s larger caliber rifle, but I didn’t say anything because I was so happy to be hunting for the first time. I didn’t get a deer that year but one afternoon hunting alone on the round volcanic hill we called Chato, I saw a giant brown bear lying in the sun below the hilltop. Dead or just sleeping, I couldn’t tell. I was cautious because I already knew what hours of searching for motion, for the outline of a deer, for the color of a deer’s hide can do to the imagination. I already knew how easily the weathered branches of a dead juniper could resemble antlers because I had walked with my father on hunts since I was eight. So I stood motionless for a long time until my breathing was more calm and my heart wasn’t beating so hard. I even shifted my eyes away for a moment hoping to see my uncle Polly or my cousin Richard who was hunting the ridges nearby.
I knew there were no bears that large on Mt. Taylor; I was pretty sure there were no bears that large anywhere. But when I looked back at the slope above me, the giant brown bear was still lying on the sunny slope of the hill above patches of melting snow and tall yellow grass. I watched it for a long time, for any sign of motion, for its breathing, but I wasn’t close enough to tell for sure. If it was dead I wanted to be able to examine it up close. It occurred to me that I could fire my rifle over its head but I knew better than to wake a bear with only a .30-30. All this time I had only moved my eyes, and my arms were getting numb from holding the rifle in the same position for so long. As quietly and as carefully as I probably will ever move, I turned and walked away from the giant bear, still down wind from it. After I had gone a distance down the slope I stopped to look back to see if it was still a giant brown bear sunning itself on one of the last warm afternoons of the year, and not just damp brown earth and a lightning-struck log above the snow patches. But the big dark bear remained there, on the south slope of Chato, with its head facing southeast, the eyes closed, motionless. I hurried the rest of the way down the ridge, listening closely to the wind at my back for sounds, glancing over my shoulder now and then.
I never told anyone what I had seen because I knew they don’t let people who see such things carry .30-30’s or hunt deer with them.
The Buffalo Dancers commemorate the transformation of the Buffalo Spirit Being into human form and the alliance that existed between humans and buffalo.
Two years later, on the north side of Chato, my Uncle
Polly was rewarded for his patience by the “old man
of the mountain” as my uncle had called him—the mule
deer whose antlers were as wide as a gun rack. As soon
as the big buck had gone down, Uncle Polly signaled
so those of us close by could go help.
As I cut across the south slope to reach my Uncle
I realized it was middle afternoon almost the same
time of day as before, except this year no snow
had fallen yet.
I walked past the place deliberately.
I found no bones, but when a wind moved through the
light yellow grass that afternoon I hurried around the
hill to find my uncle.
Sleeping, not dead, I decided.
Rain clouds and the rainstorm in the distance with the natural sandstone rain cistern in the foreground represent two fundamental elements of human survival on this high desert plateau in New Mexico. The scene might be from a thousand years ago. Water has always been scarce here, and the sandstone cisterns of rainwater are precious and sacred to the Laguna and Acoma people.
My sisters, Gigi and Wendy, stand behind me with the pottery water jars balanc
ed on their heads as the Laguna women did in the old days when they carried water. We are at the edge of the Laguna village rainwater cistern, which is still revered by the people. Our cousins Rachel Anaya and Esther Anaya Johnson from Paguate loaned us the traditional Laguna Pueblo clothing and moccasins as well as the beautiful old turquoise and silver to wear for the photograph.
Aunt Alice told my sisters and me this story one time when she came to stay with us while our parents had gone up to Mt. Taylor deer hunting. I was seven years old the last time I had to stay behind. And I felt very sad about not getting to go hunting. Maybe that’s why Aunt Alice told us this story.
Once there was a young Laguna girl
who was a fine hunter
who hunted deer and rabbits
just like the boys and the men did.
You know there have been Laguna women
who were good hunters
who could hunt as well as any of the men.
The girl’s name was Kochininako and
she would go out hunting
and bring home rabbits
sometimes deer
whatever she could find
she’d bring them home to her mother and her sisters.
This one time
she had been hunting
all morning
south of Laguna village
a distance past the sand hills
and she thought
she would start toward home.
She was just coming past
Tchi mu yah a mesa
when she met up with
a great big animal
called Estrucuyu.
Estrucuyu was some kind of giant
they had back in those days
The giant Estrucuyu saw the rabbits
Kochininako had hanging from her belt
she had four or five big rabbits
she had gotten that morning.
And he asked her
if she would throw him one of the rabbits.
So she did
and he just gobbled it up
in a minute’s time
because he was so big.
He had a great big head
and he asked for another one
and another one.
Pretty soon
she threw
every one of the rabbits
she had
to this Estrucuyu
and he just swallowed them
like they were little crumbs.