Leslie Silko - The Almanac of the Dead

“The truth is the Ghost Dance did not end with the murder of Big Foot and one hundred and forty-four Ghost Dance worshipers at Wounded Knee. The Ghost Dance has never ended, it has continued, and the people have never stopped dancing; they may call it by other names, but when they dance, their hearts are reunited with the spirits of beloved ancestors and the loved ones recently lost in the struggle. Throughout the Americas, from Chile to Canada, the people have never stopped dancing; as the living dance, they are joined again with all our ancestors before them, who cry out, who demand justice, and who call the people to take back the Americas!”

Weasel Tail threw back his shoulders and puffed out his chest; he was going to read poetry:

The spirit army is approaching,

The spirit army is approaching,

The whole world is moving onward,

The whole world is moving onward.

See! Everybody is standing watching.

See! Everybody is standing watching.

The whole world is coming,

A nation is coming, a nation is coming,

The Eagle has brought the message to the tribe.

The father says so, the father says so.

Over the whole earth they are coming.

The buffalo are coming, the buffalo are coming,

The Crow has brought the message to the tribe,

The father says so, the father says so.

I’yche’! ana’nisa’na’—Uhi’yeye’heye’!

I’yche’! ana’nisa’na’—Uhi’yeye’heye’!

I’yehe’! ha’dawu’hana’—Eye’ae’yuhe’yu!

I’yehe’! ha’dawu’hana’—Eye’ae’yuhe’yu!

Ni’athu’-a-u’a’haka’nith’ii — Ahe’yuhe’yu!

[Translation]

I’yehe’! my children — Uhi’yeye’heye’!

I’yehe’! my children — Uhi’yeye’heye’!

I’yehe’! we have rendered them

desolate — Eye’ae’yuhe’yu!

I’yehe’! we have rendered them

desolate — Eye’ae’yuhe’yu!

The whites are crazy — Ahe’yuhe’yu!

Again, when Weasel Tail had finished, the ballroom was hushed; then the audience had given Weasel Tail a standing ovation.

“Have the spirits let us down? Listen to the prophecies! Next to thirty thousand years, five hundred years look like nothing. The buffalo are returning. They roam off federal land in Montana and Wyoming. Fences can’t hold them. Irrigation water for the Great Plains is disappearing, and so are the farmers, and their plows. Farmers’ children retreat to the cities. Year by year the range of the buffalo grows a mile or two larger.”

Weasel Tail had them eating out of his hand; he let his voice trail off dramatically to a stage whisper that had resonated throughout the ballroom speaker system. The audience leapt to its feet with a great ovation. Lecha had to hand it to Wilson Weasel Tail; he’d learned a thing or two. Still, Weasel Tail was a lawyer at heart; Lecha noted that he had made the invaders an offer that couldn’t be refused. Weasel Tail had said to the U.S. government, “Give back what you have stolen or else as a people you will continue your self-destruction.”

GREEN VENGEANCE — ECO-WARRIORS

THERE WERE FORTY-FIVE minutes of recess before the Barefoot Hopi made the keynote speech. Lecha had searched until she located Zeta, sitting with her computer expert, Awa Gee. Awa Gee had intercepted a coded fax message that the eco-warriors planned to make a surprise appearance at the healers convention. Zeta looked exhausted and nervous. Neither of them had had much sleep since the shooting. Ferro had not known his lover was an undercover cop. But then Lecha had not known Seese had kept a kilo of cocaine in her closet either. Secrets and coincidences involving cocaine didn’t surprise Lecha anymore; how odd that Zeta seemed so upset. Lecha whispered in Zeta’s ear, “What’s the matter?” Zeta had looked around, then leaned close and whispered, “I killed Greenlee yesterday.” Lecha nodded. So the time had come.

Ferro was the problem now; Ferro had loaded a junker car with six hundred pounds of dynamite to park outside the Prince Road police substation. Zeta had tried to persuade Ferro to hold off retaliation at least until the preparations she and Awa Gee had been making through the computer networks had been completed. They only needed time for Awa Gee to run Greenlee’s access numbers, but Ferro had refused to listen. Still Ferro couldn’t make a bomb that size overnight. Awa Gee’s guess had been it would take a week for a competent bomb maker to load the car properly and wire it correctly to the detonation device.

Just when Zeta was beginning to think the holistic medicine convention was a bust, a great commotion had developed near the steps to the ballroom stage and podium at the far end. Zeta and Lecha had both stood up, but they were too short; Awa Gee leaped up on his chair where he could see over all the heads. “There!” Awa Gee said. He excitedly patted Zeta on the shoulder. “I told you they’d come!”

The two eco-warriors wore ski masks and identical camouflage jumpsuits; they did not appear to be armed and Zeta saw no bodyguards around the podium. The eco-warriors had motioned for the audience to take its seats, and there on the stage with the eco-warriors Zeta saw the Barefoot Hopi impeccably dressed in a three-piece suit and tie and wearing Hopi moccasins instead of boots or shoes. The Hopi stood close to the eco-warriors, who were listening intently to the Hopi. The rumors about the alliance between the Hopi’s organization and the Green Vengeance group apparently were true. Zeta was in agreement with the tactic. Green Vengeance eco-warriors would make useful allies at least at the start. Green Vengeance had a great deal of wealth behind their eco-warrior campaigns.

A convention organizer had announced the Hopi was going to introduce a special unscheduled appearance of Green Vengeance, who came with an urgent message. The noise in the main ballroom and in the corridors outside had hushed as the Hopi approached the microphone; a buzz of whispers began as the Hopi had pressed a button on the podium, and a giant video screen lowered to the center of the stage.

“Friends, you have all heard state and federal authorities blame ‘structural failure’ for the collapse of Glen Canyon Dam. Now you are about to see videotape footage never before made public by our allies in the struggle, Green Vengeance, eco-warriors in the defense of the earth!”

The ballroom’s overhead lights had dimmed, and a jerky sequence, videotaped from a moving vehicle, filled the giant screen. The sound track and any voices on the videotape had been deliberately removed. The brilliant burnt reds and oranges of the sandstone formations and the dark green juniper bushes flashing past appeared to be Utah or northern Arizona. Next came interiors of motel rooms with figures in ski masks and camouflage clothing standing by motel beds stacked with assault rifles and clips of ammunition. The camera had avoided the masked faces and focused instead on the hands carefully arranging black boxes in nests of foam rubber; the foam-rubber bundles were packed carefully inside nylon backpacks. A close-up of a black box before its lid was closed showed a nine-volt battery and wires. On the worn gold motel bedspread, the hands had strung the six backpacks together with bright blue wire. Awa Gee leaned over and whispered in Zeta’s ear, “I can’t wait to see this!”

Next, the screen had been filled with highway signs and U.S. park service signs; in the background was the huge concrete mass that had trapped the Colorado River and had created Lake Powell.

GLEN CANYON DAM; the sign had filled the entire screen. Next the concrete bulwark of the dam came into focus; tiny figures dangled off ropes down the side of the dam. At first none of the park service employees or bystanders and tourists appear to notice. Then the camera had zoomed in for close-ups of each of the six eco-warriors, each with a backpack loaded with explosives in the motel room. Zeta had been thinking the six resembled spiders on a vast concrete wall when suddenly the giant video screen itself appeared to crack and shatter in slow motion, and the six spiderlike figures had disappeared in a white flash of smoke and dust. The entire top half of the dam structure had folded over, collapsing behind a giant wall of reddish water. Zeta heard gasps from the audience.