Читать книгу Waterless Mountain - Laura Adams Armer - Страница 8
ОглавлениеSPRING POLLEN
LDER BROTHER riding his pony up from the wash had lost patience with the burro he was trying to drive ahead of him. He whacked the animal with a stick but it stood stubbornly immovable halfway up the bank. The two water kegs slung on each side of it were full of muddy alkaline water from the spring. The burro objected to climbing the steep bank. Elder Brother had coaxed and prodded with his stick till his temper was bad. He cried wrathfully, “You child of a snake! You castout of poverty! Move, move!”
The burro did not move. He only waved one long ear disdainfully. Elder Brother was desperate. He disliked the task of hauling the water. It was beneath his dignity. Again he belabored the burro. Again he swore, “Blockhead from the land of hunger! I will fix you. I will make you move.”
Veering his pony he rode back to the spring, where a stunted juniper grew in the rocks. He picked some leaves and chewed them carefully and deliberately. Then he rode in front of the stubborn burro and with great solemnity spat the juice of the juniper in the burro’s face.
The animal swerved and some loosened rock rolling down the bank, splashed in the shallow stream. The burro’s uncertain footing gave him no choice. He moved forward.
Elder Brother’s anger gradually faded away and riding through the sagebrush, he experienced the calm which is born of faith. He had never known the juniper to fail.
It was only a mile back to camp. Up by the red sandstone cliff he could see his little brother coming with the sheep. He waved his hand to him, and when within speaking distance said, “Juice of the juniper adds speed to the legs. Our people are wise in their teachings. If a thing will not go, spit the juice of the juniper in its face.”
“What will happen then?” Younger Brother asked.
“It will go, it will move. Remember, juice of the juniper is strong magic for motion.”
“I shall remember,” said the little boy, as he looked at his handsome brother with pride and admiration. He thought he was almost as wise as Uncle. He would remember about the juniper.
After the two boys reached home and their chores were done for the day, the little boy ran to a cave not far from the hogan. Here it was that he kept his treasures. Not that he had many, but they were very precious.
There was no place in the hogan to keep things. If Mother took off her turquoise necklace, she dug a little hole in the sand floor, put the beads in and covered them with her own special sheepskin.
No one would think of touching Mother’s turquoise, but Younger Brother would never leave his treasures where anyone could find them. First of all no one would know they were treasures. That was the worst of it.
To reach his secret cave in a cliff, it was necessary to climb to the top of a boulder. From it he could just reach the floor of the cave whose opening was so small, he could only enter by lying on his stomach and wriggling in. After he was in he could sit up without bumping his head and reach back to a little ledge where he kept his treasures.
He was very happy thinking of his new prize. He said to himself, “Today my heap will welcome a great one.”
He took the red bandana off of his hair and smoothed it out on the floor of the cave. Then from his shirt he took the eagle feather Yellow Beak had sent from the blue. Carefully he wrapped it in the red bandana. Lovingly he lifted it to his lips and blew on it four times, before he placed it on the little ledge at the back of the cave. He put a rock on it to hold it safely.
This was a very important ceremony for Younger Brother. He was thinking of Yellow Beak, his new strong friend, who lived somewhere in the sky beyond the reach of human eyes.
He thought of all his friends. He had keepsakes from all of them. From the Star Children he had bits of sparkling mica. From the Wind he had four little pieces of petrified wood. They were of four different colors. One was white, one was gray-blue, one was yellow and one was black.
Younger Brother kept the white piece on the east side of the cave, the blue on the south, the yellow on the west, the black on the north side. This was very necessary because those are the right colors for the four cardinal points. Uncle had told him about the colors and he had never forgotten.
He liked his little pieces of petrified wood because the strong wind had uncovered them in the sand for him, and besides they were smooth and such beautiful colors.
Perhaps he liked best of all his stones, the one the Red Ant People had given him. It was a dark red garnet that he could look through. The Red Ants were rather a fearful people. Most Navahos stayed away from ant hills for very good reasons of their own. Younger Brother knew these reasons and he never walked too close to an ant hill.
One day a little lamb who was weak and tired from the hot sunshine, fell right down on an ant hill. Younger Brother ran to pick him up. He carried the tired little lamb to its mother. When he put it on the ground he found the beautiful red stone stuck in the wool of the lamb’s back. The Ant People had put it there. They had brought it up from the underworld with all the other gravel.
Younger Brother had never told anyone about that, because his people were afraid of ants, but he knew the ants wanted the little lamb to have the red stone, so he kept it along with his other treasures in the cave.
And what do you think he kept it in? A little pottery bowl! He had found that bowl in the sand after a big rain. His friends, the clouds sent that and it had cloud patterns drawn with black on its beautiful white surface.
His friends were so kind to him he liked to think of them all. He remembered the good strawberry jam, that the Big Man had given to him. He looked at the paper he had saved from the can. It had red-colored mountains painted on it At least he thought they were mountains. Maybe they were ant hills. He had never seen a fresh strawberry, so how was he to know they were strawberries on the paper? That was the best keepsake he had so far from the Big Man and he put it in the little pottery bowl of the clouds.
As he sat in his treasure cave he could look out on the eastern sky. It was colored like the red stone when he held it to the sun. He thought the whole earth might be a red stone for the sun to look through just before it set in the west. Probably it was. He couldn’t see any reason why it shouldn’t be. The sky at noon was a big turquoise bowl. He knew that, and at night it was the darkness stone of jet, set all over with shining stars.
Younger Brother wondered if Father had finished the bracelet yet. He would go back to the hogan and see. That was to be his keepsake from Father and from the blue sky because the turquoise belonged to the sky.
By the time he reached the hogan the sun had finished looking through the ruby-red earth and everything was gray.
It was good to be inside for supper. Mother had made a fine rabbit stew and the corn cakes he liked so well. The cakes were baked in the Dutch oven that came from the trading post.
After supper Father tried the bracelet on Younger Brother’s wrist. It was perfect and everybody was happy. Father knew how to make such beautiful things with his hands. He couldn’t tell stories the way Uncle did but his silver work made the boy think of moonlight on the mesas.
Younger Brother fell asleep early, holding one hand over his new bracelet and holding in his mind all the beautiful secrets of the day.
The next morning was lovelier than the last and everyone lingered long about the breakfast fire. Father, having finished the bracelet, felt like doing nothing in particular. Mother was in no hurry to weave. She smiled at Baby Sister playing in the sand. Elder Brother thought he might ride to the post. He needed more cartridges for his rifle.
Only Younger Brother must be busy because the sheep were already bleating to be out of the corral. He didn’t mind because he might have some more adventures. Even if he didn’t it would be all right because he had so much to think about.
Just to watch the sheep grazing made him think about the grass and how it grew after the rain. He thought of its roots underground. He thought of seeds underground, waiting in the darkness for the rain to moisten them and swell them so they could burst into leaves and roots.
Surely growing things were magical. They liked water to drink the same as people did. He wondered what they ate. Probably deep in the ground all the roots had their food. It was fun to think of all the little roots of plants sitting around eating dinner. Plants did not walk the way people did but some plants tried to. There was the squash vine. It tried to travel.
Two things he had noticed—everything on the earth grew upward toward the sun and things under the earth grew downward toward the water. He had heard about the Under-Water People, like the fish and the snakes.
While Younger Brother thought about these mysteries of the earth, he drove the sheep up a trail on the mesa. They were nearly to the top and had found extra good grass among the bushes. Younger Brother noticed that things were beginning to bloom. Butterfly lilies and red feather flowers were looking at him.
A big bumble bee, all yellow with pollen, flew out of a lily. Younger Brother wondered if the Bumble Bee People gathered the pollen for ceremonies the way the Navahos do. He watched the bumble bee go to another flower.
He put his feet down in pollen. He put his hands down in pollen. He put his head down in pollen. He was enacting the magic formula the Spider Woman gave the Children of the Sun. Younger Brother was much interested and he found himself saying to the bumble bee:
“Your feet are pollen, your hands are pollen, your body is pollen, your mind is pollen, your voice is pollen. The trail is beautiful, be still.”
No sooner had he finished saying this than the bumble bee flew right onto the top of his head. Younger Brother held perfectly still wondering what was happening. The bumble bee had put his feet down with pollen on the boy’s black hair. He had walked right around in a circle and then flown away bumbling.
Younger Brother wondered why he felt so extra happy that day. He didn’t know there was a golden ring of pollen on his head. Only the Sky People looking down could see that.
The birds sang more sweetly as they flew over him. Every living thing seemed wrapped in peace. Bright-colored butterflies spread their wings over the lilies.
Younger Brother held his new bracelet up to the sky to see how it matched his turquoise. They were so near of a color he thought it must be a piece of sky that was set in the silver.
The Sun Bearer traveling to the west saw the little hand lifted toward him and he said with joy:
“Surely the children of the earth are restored in beauty.”
