White Elk Quotes

I did not see anything [New York 1886] to help my people. I could see that the Wasichus [white man] did not care for each other the way our people did before the nation's hoop was broken. They would take everything from each other if they could, and so there were some who had more of everything than they could use, while crowds of people had nothing at all and maybe were starving. This could not be better than the old ways of my people.

Zoom out and what you see is one species--us--struggling to keep all others in their appropriate places, or at least in the places we've decided they ought to stay. In some areas, we want cows but not bison, or mule deer but not coyotes, or cars but not elk. Or sheep but not elk. Or bighorn sheep but not aoudad sheep. Or else we'd like wolves and cows in the *same* place. Or natural gas tankers swimming harmoniously with whales. We are everywhere in the wilderness with white gloves on, directing traffic.

I was still a boy when I left the Ozarks, only sixteen years old. Since that day, I’ve left my footprints in many lands: the frozen wastelands of the Arctic, the bush country of Old Mexico, and the steaming jungles of Yucatán. Throughout my life, I’ve been a lover of the great outdoors. I have built campfires in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, and hunted wild turkey in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee and the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. I have climbed the Grand Tetons of Wyoming, and hunted bull elk in the primitive area of Idaho. I can truthfully say that, regardless of where I have roamed or wandered, I have always looked for the fairy ring. I have never found one, but I’ll keep looking and hoping. If the day ever comes that I walk up to that snow-white circle, I’ll step into the center of it, kneel down, and make one wish, for in my heart I believe in the legend of the rare fairy ring.

When I returned, she held out her hand to show me an elk vertebra as white as ivory. She said: “There are so many bones here. You just don’t see them until you sit still.

Poem for My Father You closed the door. I was on the other side, screaming. It was black in your mind. Blacker than burned-out fire. Blacker than poison. Outside everything looked the same. You looked the same. You walked in your body like a living man. But you were not. would you not speak to me for weeks would you hang your coat in the closet without saying hello would you find a shoe out of place and beat me would you come home late would i lose the key would you find my glasses in the garbage would you put me on your knee would you read the bible to me in your smoking jacket after your mother died would you come home drunk and snore would you beat me on the legs would you carry me up the stairs by my hair so that my feet never touch the bottom would you make everything worse to make everything better i believe in god, the father almighty, the maker of heaven, the maker of my heaven and my hell. would you beat my mother would you beat her till she cries like a rabbit would you beat her in a corner of the kitchen while i am in the bathroom trying to bury my head underwater would you carry her to the bed would you put cotton and alcohol on her swollen head would you make love to her hair would you caress her hair would you rub her breasts with ben gay until she stinks would you sleep in the other room in the bed next to me while she sleeps on the pull-out cot would you come on the sheet while i am sleeping. later i look for the spot would you go to embalming school with the last of my mother's money would i see your picture in the book with all the other black boys you were the handsomest would you make the dead look beautiful would the men at the elks club would the rich ladies at funerals would the ugly drunk winos on the street know ben pretty ben regular ben would your father leave you when you were three with a mother who threw butcher knives at you would he leave you with her screaming red hair would he leave you to be smothered by a pillow she put over your head would he send for you during the summer like a rich uncle would you come in pretty corduroys until you were nine and never heard from him again would you hate him would you hate him every time you dragged hundred pound cartons of soap down the stairs into white ladies' basements would you hate him for fucking the woman who gave birth to you hate him flying by her house in the red truck so that other father threw down his hat in the street and stomped on it angry like we never saw him (bye bye to the will of grandpa bye bye to the family fortune bye bye when he stompled that hat, to the gold watch, embalmer's palace, grandbaby's college) mother crying silently, making floating island sending it up to the old man's ulcer would grandmother's diamonds close their heartsparks in the corner of the closet yellow like the eyes of cockroaches? Old man whose sperm swims in my veins, come back in love, come back in pain.

My garden is covered in ice and snow. A pair of light green rose leaves, which still "confess color", look all the more striking; like a bulwark against the 500 shades of winter grey. Like stars twinkling in the dark of the night. How bright a single candle illuminates a pitch black room. A glimmer of Hope.

...because a man on the scent of the White House is rarely rational. He is more like a beast in heat: a bull elk in the rut, crashing blindly through the timber in a fever for something to fuck. Anything! A cow, a calf, a mare--any flesh and blood beast with a hole in it.The bull elk is a very crafty animal for about fifty weeks of the year; his senses are so sharp that only an artful stalker can get within a thousand yards of him...butwhen the rut comes on, in the autumn, any geek with the sense to blow an elk-whistle can lure a bull elk right up to his car in ten minutes if he can drive within hearing range. The dumb bastards lose all control of themselves when the rut comes on. Their eyes glaze over, their ears pack up with hot wax, and their loins get heavy with blood. Anything that sounds like a cow elk in heat will fuse the central nervous systems of every bull on the mountain. They will race through the timbers like huge cannonballs, trampling small trees and scraping off bloody chunks of their own hair on the unyielding bark of the big ones. They behave like sharks in a feeding frenzy, attacking each other with all the demented violence of human drug dealers gone mad on their own wares. A career politician finally smelling the White House is not Much different from a bull elk in the rut. He will stop at nothing, trashing anything that gets in his way; and anything he can't handle personally, he will hire out--or, failing that, make a deal. It is a difficult syndrome for most people to understand, because so few of us ever come close to the kind of Ultimate Power and Achievement that the White House represents to a career politician.

Untold numbers of readers of Black Elk Speaks and When the Tree Flowered have wished to understand more fully the relationship between Neihardt and Black Elk and the role that Neihardt played as Black Elk's amanuensis. They have also been curious to learn about Black Elk's life after the Wounded Knee massacre. How was it that a nineteenth-century Lakota mystic could live a full half of the twentieth century on the Pine Ridge Reservation in harmony with the encroaching white man's world? The Sixth Grandfather is presented in order to help readers answer these questions. The title of the book is doubly appropriate. Black Elk, in his great vision, saw himself as the "sixth grandfather," the spirit of the earth, the power to nurture and make grow. Symbolically, Black Elk's teachings, transmitted through Neihardt, have had a marvelous generative power: they have grown and blossomed and become an inspiration for millions, Indians and non-Indians alike. Through Neihardt's writings, the sacred tree of Black Elk's vision has truly conic to bloom.

know that the first mineral product of the Ohio Valley was salt?” Ned asked. When Nancy shook her head, he went on, “As you know, salt has been an essential food for man and animal since the beginning of time. In prehistoric days salt attracted not only human inhabitants to this area, but also animals like the giant sloth, the mammoth elk, deer, and buffalo.” “That’s fascinating,” said Nancy. “Don’t stop.” “Professor will relate one more story and that’s the end of his knowledge.” Nancy giggled and Ned went on, “The Indians here were fearful that the white men would take away all their territory, so they raided and burned settlements. It was not until the American Army took over that the raids were stopped, around 1794.” By this time Ned was nearing Pine Hill. Nancy happened to look up the high embankment at the woods which ran to the Rorick garden. Suddenly she caught a flash of sunlight on glass. “Ned,” she said, “somebody is watching us with binoculars! See him up there among the trees?” Ned turned to look, resting his paddle. “You think that’s your phantom?” he asked.

The bugle call of a bull elk in a high mountain basin, the haunting voice of a screech owl on a moonlit night, the song of a white-throated sparrow on a cold winter's morning, or the resounding call of a wild turkey gobbler in spring - there are a certain few sounds in nature that seem to symbolize true wilderness. A gentle north wind moving through a remote forest of longleaf pine on a clear winter's day is one of those voices that stirs something deep inside of us. The grandest organ in the greatest cathedral is but a moan in the darkness by comparison.

The daily thunderstorms had stopped, and without the storms, the elk stopped sheltering in the dense forest. They went up the slopes, and we followed them. We had to leave the lake behind, but it was fine because I had my family, and family was more important than fish.

I wish I understood their language, and could speak with them,” she said when they were alone again. “I think I did learn a few words, though, Dosa bia’isa.” She glanced up at him expectantly. Daniel’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “I know that’s what they call you, and they call me Dosa haiwi, although I don’t know what these words mean.” Daniel smiled. “To the Tukudeka, I am known as White Wolf, and Elk Runner gave you the name White Dove. But I prefer to call you gediki.” “Meaning?” She faced him, her hands on her hips. “It refers to a wild cat.

If she is promised to another man, how long will you wait to see if he comes for her?” “I have no intention of keeping her,” Daniel said in exasperation. Elk Runner gave a hearty laugh.  “Your eyes betray you, White Wolf. As sure as the sun comes up every morning, you want this woman.” Daniel ignored his brother’s remark. “If I have to, I’ll wait until my father returns, then I will take her back to St. Louis myself before the first snow.” “You will not be able to stay out of her sleeping blankets that long,” Elk Runner predicted with confidence. “This woman has you bewitched. It is like I said before. Perhaps the spirits brought her to you because they know a man should not live without a woman.” Daniel threw a stick in the fire, sending glowing embers into the air. Elk Runner tore a piece of meat from his skewer, and laughed.

She has a gentle hand.” Elk Runner grinned at Daniel. “But you would not know this, would you, White Wolf?” 

Daniel observed her from afar, and tried in vain to conceal the hunger in his eyes. She showed none of the disdain against the Indians that he had encountered from whites back east. Aimee was genuinely warm and friendly with these people who were like family to him. She obviously loved children. She played games with the younger ones, and each time she held Elk Runner’s infant in her arms, a new wave of desire spread through him. He tried not to think about what it would be like to see her holding a child, their child, in her arms. That could never happen. His white mother had died in this wilderness, giving birth to him. No matter how she dressed, or her abilities on the trail, Aimee was still a white woman. Like a beautiful spring flower, she would wither and die in these mountains. Neither lasted long in this harsh environment.

To be is to belong to all that is to receive...worth ... White Elk

Crow?” I leaned against the counter. He took a deep breath. “Yes, but not River or Mountain Band. He is something else.” I pointed toward the moccasins. “The bead pattern is one I’ve never seen; it’s geometric, but not the Crow that I know.” He knelt by the bars and examined the medicine bag and moccasins, though I noticed he touched neither, and nodded. “Kicked-in-the-Belly.” I waited a moment. “You mind telling a heathen devil white man what that is?” He pivoted and sat on the floor with his back to the cell, which Dog took as an invitation and joined him. “Eelalapi’io, a shunned band, one of thirteen exogamous maternal clans; fourth clan, grouped with ackya’pkawi’a, or Bad War Honors. ” I watched as he thought about it, first categorizing the information and then translating it so that it would be relatable to me linguistically and culturally. “Seventeen-twenty-seven, or thereabouts, there was a Crow war party led by Young White Buffalo that raided the Fat River country and came back with a very strange animal. This animal was as large as the elk but with rounded hooves, a long tail, and mane; it had no antlers, and the tribe was very interested in this new thing. A brave got too close to the

that sought to tear out his throat. The firelight gleamed on the scars that decorated Walking Elk’s chest and shoulders—thick white gouges that showed briefly at the gaping neck of his shirt as he writhed picturesquely, arms straining upward against his invisible enemy. Ian found himself leaning forward, his

Wherever we went, the soldiers came to kill us and it was all our own country. It was ours already when the white men made the treaty with Red Cloud, that said it would be ours as long as grass should grow and water flow. That was only eight winters before, and they were chasing us now because we remembered and they forgot.

And yet the Clatsops and Chinooks, without rifles, managed to live much better than the Americans on the coast of the Pacific Northwest. They had mastered the environment far better than the men of the expedition managed to do. The resources they drew on were renewable, whereas the Americans had shot out all the elk in the vicinity in just three months. With the coming of spring, the Corps of Discovery had no choice but to move on. The natives stayed, living prosperous lives on the riches of the Pacific Northwest, until the white man’s diseases got them.

For the next couple of hours the dark mass of the primeval forest whisked past my peripheral vision, thick and tall, the white-painted trees soaring into the cerulean sky like watchful sentinels. This was an apt metaphor because watched was exactly how I felt. I didn’t know why. Zero animal life populated the woods. Not a single moose, elk, bird, or deer. I suppose the uncanny sensation might have been due to the profound silence that pervaded the winter day, which the whine of the snowmobile engines only seemed to accentuate. It was the same silence I’d experienced outside Fyodor’s cabin. What had I called it then? Predatory? Yes, predatory. It insinuated something primordial, something threatening and patient that didn’t jive with the modern cacophony of honking car horns, coffee-shop chatter, TV news anchors rambling off the day’s events, radio DJs counting down top-ten lists. In place of all this existed…nothing, a void…and on an existential level that was alien and frightening and, yes, predatory. It hinted at death and reinforced the simple fact that we didn’t belong here. Disco, Olivia, Vasily, me. Not even Fyodor.

warriors to ride with White Fox and take him to Storm Warrior. As White Fox followed one of the scouts, the other two rode behind him. White Fox looked back and noticed that Red Elk led the war party of twenty-five warriors northeast towards the advancing Pawnee.

A native policeman wore a white man’s uniform, lived in a frame house, and earned a monthly salary at a time when his fellows lived off government rations. Such status and income could be a powerful “civilizing” influence, and the officer could be a major force in ending traditional practices such as dancing, polygamy, and the power of the medicine men.

There’s a little canyon in the park where so much methane gas is produced naturally out of the ground that any living thing that wanders into it will die within minutes. The floor of the canyon is covered in elk and bison bones, and maybe even some old Indian bones.” He’d softened his voice and she found it oddly rhythmic. She felt a chill ripple through her. “But when you look at that white patch,” he said, “I want you to imagine something else. Imagine most of Yellowstone Park itself is that white patch. There’s a real thin crust covering hell itself, which is trying to boil over. That wants to boil over. And someday, it will. It’s known as the Yellowstone Caldera. In fact, darlin’, when it blows it’ll take two million people with it. It’s blown a few times through history, and we’re sixty thousand years overdue.

What is an Indian?", asked Commissioner Thomas Morgan two years after the Wounded Knee massacre. And his answer, "blood and land". He was right, but not in a way he understood. If the U.S. army and government had spent more in the ruthless elimination of the tribes, root and branch, as Sherman hoped, then strangled off their resources as Congress wanted, the "Indian problem" would have been solved. But nothing is straightforward in American history, not even ruthlessness and the nation's better angels prevented total genocide. Their hearts were right but their methods were mad. To save the Indian, they reasoned, they must kill the Indian inside. Thus began decades of social engineering rivaling the darkest visions of Aldous Huxley and George Orwell. The reservation was the laboratory where new and often contradictory policies were introduced and tested much like those classic social experiments where lab rats are shocked and rewarded but always randomly. Each era had its own philosophy. Assimilation, reeducation, christianization and termination of the tribes. Yet the purpose of each was similar. Strip the Indian of his "Indian-ness", then reshape him as an idealized american, stamped and milled as if in a machine. It is easy to see why the young rebels of AIM felt such loathing for the BIA and Washington. In the parlance of the counter-culture, they saw it as "the machine". How does one survive in such a world? The machine is overwhelming and unstoppable, larger than any one woman or man. Black Elk saw it early, though he never used such dystopian terms. Perhaps the only true defense is the most intimate, preservation of one's soul. Seen that way, his life is more than just another tale of Indian vs. white, it becomes instead a parable of modern man.

In Georgia, after the Trail of Tears, most traces of the remarkable Cherokee Nation disappeared. The Cherokee mission schools were torn down, and the town of New Echota was destroyed. The land where the council house and the taverns and the missionary houses had once stood was made into fields. All traces of the proud capital were plowed under like the rotting stalks of last year's corn. Now, in all of Georgia and Alabama, there is nothing left of the nation that had lived there for a thousand years before the white man came. The Cherokees are gone, pulled up by the roots and cast to the westward wind. They are gone like the buffalo and the elk which once roamed the mountain valleys. They have disappeared like the passenger pigeons which once darkened the sky as great flocks flew over the river routes from north to south and back again. Like wayah, the wolf, and like the chestnut trees, the Cherokees are no longer found in the mountains of Georgia. Now only the names remain: Dahlonega, Chattahoochee, Oostenaula, Etowah, Nantahala, Tennessee, Ellijay, Tallulah, Chatooga, Nacoochee, Hiawasee, Chickamauga, Tugaloo, Chattanooga . . .