I float up slowly and check for wounds but they are not there. I know I was just knifed but I’m ok now. I’m filled with deep anguish and regret.
I have been ousted from my tribe. It is with them I have my only life. Have I done something wrong? But no, I was only defending what I thought was right. I would have to do the same thing should the circumstance occur again.
The chief had sold me out! I suddenly remembered how that felt, like I was dying then to be separated from them..they were my whole life. I was with tribal consciousness said a mentor later. I did not understand this mentor who came in light until later. He said on the other side of my learning was individuality.
Tears kept falling. The chief had said the white man picked me in trade. But how can it be possible that a squaw should be sold this way? I was filled with savage anger. It would be my demise but I could do no other thing for I was dead already to be separated from the others, I was midwife and proud. I helped birth the new life in our tribe. I held something precious next to my breast and felt the love of the mother and the bond circled palpatedly between us in this magical moment. The children all became mine that I helped bring in.
When the mother would cry out in pain, it was I who soothed her, this bonded us forever, I was grateful to help. I cry now to think of those others I now had left. I would not preside over the youngsters who grew up. I was dead. I knew I had been knifed by the brave sent to do this deed although the wound I could not perceive. As I looked closer I followed a picture in my mind to another dimension. Ah, that’s my body, now I see the wound. Already the squaws are covering it with rock. The chief said no, do not honor her, she has disobeyed my law. She failed to sacrifice herself for the good of the tribe. she must be example.
But I was momentarily gladdened, they had come for me when his back was turned. I cried some more, would I ever stop?
I was now a ghost in the camp. Some 50 linear years would slip by as I sent my love into the tribe, unable to move on even if I’d thought about it. I was theirs and they were mine. The great Spirit in the sky could wait. My god was the tribe. I was often able to enter the mind of a wee one to keep this one from falling into the creek. What I had helped bring forth I would not let die so quickly! At night I joined in the dancing around the fire. They saw me not but our spirits were joined that way. I spoke softly with love to them and sometimes they felt me and nodded to say, yes, I remember you always. Yes, I will use the Burdock root for this ailment.
As each expired from the flesh I was there in greeting and we waited for the others to finish up. White man would own the land soon. Our tribal wave would join the larger tribe eventually and we would make new plans as one wave, but for now we gathered slightly ajar to the physical dimension in order to gather all our members. My grief began to subside but it had become a part of me. An elder, a chieftain whom I had known as a child appeared from nowhere and began to teach me while I waited for the others how to harness the power of emotions into doing good for the others. He told me to dance. And so I danced and turned the grief into passion instead. There was another side to grief which turned the tenderness into pliant receptivity to the spirit in the sky. It ran through my soul like the river where I used to draw the water for a new birth.
The chieftain was right; I should dance. I cried over this too. I cried over everything. It was hard to die so young.
I had killed the white man. He had dragged me unto his horse gloating over his possession. I had a knife in my moccasin. It was over briefly. I was very quick. I had waited in the bushes wondering what to do. For days I watched the tribe. Finally the chief who had sold me heard from the grapevine I hid there, a slave to my love, and he sent a brave to knife me as well.
The chief and I now had karma to work out within another life. He had presented to me a delimmia. He had asked me to snuff the life breath from the babies as they came in. Instead, I wished to snuff the life breath from him. His reasoning was fallicious. He said the white man would kill the children anyway. Yes, that may be so I said but what you ask of me is impossible. If there is one day of life for a child, then that is one day, but you ask me to take from them that day of life and I cannot for I live for their lives. He had told me to go away from him, he had the world on his shoulders and must think. He began to think it was the woman’s fault that all strife in the camp occurred for he was compelled to protect us, yet here we were, making love and producing babies, as if we were not supplied by the sperm donors and just popped them out on our own. He began to think we should obey orders because we were inferior to the man.
We would settle this. But in another life.
As I danced and settled my spirit over the waiting period inbetween lives I was happy and grew in love and thanksgiving that I had had this life and each one who exited their own body were greeted by me. Soon we were all together again as if it had never happened.
We were happier together than apart and we would all set off for the larger tribe headquarters and new plans would be drawn up in excitement and celebration after a rest period. I have been remembering this life through the sound of a flute. I have a song called “Soaring” by Thomas Walker, Album Spirit Dreams. The tribe had an instrument which made a similar sound. I followed the sound into this other life catching further glimpses until it was clear who I was then is still a part of me. None of us are who we seem to be but even more.
I have met in this life the man who was the chief in the other. All is well and forgiven.