Amiu dialogue on the longest night.
Dec. 22nd, 2004 01:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pauraque_bkDialogue between Deborah Groom and 
wámmíi (Coyote Talks) on 9 fish rain, the longest night.
DG: It is very cold tonight!
w: Yes, it's cold. A cold longest night this year. The people don't want to go outside, even though the moon is nearly facing (i.e., full). It's almost only the doctors who are out on the hill, not very many people watching them.
DG: What are they doing? What is the purpose?
w: They're singing to the moon. The sun is fairly galloping now when he crosses over us, just in high spirits. Then he gets tired and lingers when he crosses the undersea side -- even though he can't see the people down there, he can't see underwater! But the sun is like that, he forgets. He forgets why he called us on the land, so he could see us in the first place, and in the winter he just runs. You heard them telling the children that story, of how we came onto the land. It's a good story for the longest night, because it shows how wild and foolish the sun is. Did you hear it?
DG: Yes... Why are the doctors singing to the moon?
w: Why wouldn't they?
DG: You said the sun is foolish...
w: Yes. But they can't sing to the sun, is that what you mean? Almost no one can sing to the sun. You can't even look at him! But the moon can counsel him. They were the same kind of creature once. You heard that, in the story, that he was like her before he came too close to the world in the time before we were here, and set himself on fire.
DG: Yes. So you sing to the moon, and the moon talks to the sun.
w: Right. The moon, she has a lot to worry about. We have our problems, and also the undersea people do, and so do the stars. She's only one woman, and she has to watch us all, like a mother with eight children and eight children again. We don't want to sing to her when it isn't needed, we don't want to be the girl who says she's drowning.
DG: But tonight it is needed.
w: Yes, this is the right time. The doctors on the hill are singing her to tell the sun to slow down when he crosses over us, to be responsible as she is. The moon always walks at the same speed.
DG: They have been singing long.
w: A long time?
DG: Yes, a long time.
w: Well, it takes a while, because they have to sing for the stars' children (i.e. the animals) who are sleeping. They have to sing the sparrows' song, and dance like the rabbits.
DG: Does it always work?
w: [laughs] Yes, it will work. The moon is persuasive. So are the doctors.
DG: You said almost no one can sing to the sun...
w: Yes.
DG: Is there anyone who can?
w: Yes, there's such a thing as a sun doctor. That's a very old thing, you can read about it in the scrolls that were brought from the east. Or you can get the keeper to read it to you. I hear there was a doctor called
máje (Panther Mother)-- that's what he was called afterwards, at least, I don't know what he was called before -- and they say he didn't have a proper father, his father had run away, or maybe was a murderer. And so Panther Mother, he wanted the sun to be his father. Not just as it goes in the story, how the sun called us onto the land, but his father to take care of him. Now, you and I can tell at once that this is foolish. And there is a turning about it, because the sun is where our folly comes from -- oh, I'm ruining the story. Well, this man looked into the sun and pleaded with him, and didn't drink any water, and eventually he heard these sun songs, which were many languages at once. Like a hummingbird's wing is many colors at once, or the inside of a shell, that was these songs. And when he came back to himself he was blind, but they say he could speak every language, and speak to the animals, as the sun can. And he could persuade the sun to do all kinds of things, and could make hot days and cold, and make the seasons longer. Anyway, the other doctors kept him and tried to teach him to sing his songs wisely, but eventually he was just dry inside, and he died.
DG: And so you sing to the moon.
w: [laughs] Well, not *because* of that, but yes.
DG: Can we go outside and hear the songs?
w: Do you want to hear them? Even though it's cold outside?
DG: Yes, I want to hear them.
w: Then we shall go.
*
This is how I work out a lot of cultural things, by writing a dialogue between a native and an imaginary questioner.
wámmíi (Coyote Talks) on 9 fish rain, the longest night.DG: It is very cold tonight!
w: Yes, it's cold. A cold longest night this year. The people don't want to go outside, even though the moon is nearly facing (i.e., full). It's almost only the doctors who are out on the hill, not very many people watching them.
DG: What are they doing? What is the purpose?
w: They're singing to the moon. The sun is fairly galloping now when he crosses over us, just in high spirits. Then he gets tired and lingers when he crosses the undersea side -- even though he can't see the people down there, he can't see underwater! But the sun is like that, he forgets. He forgets why he called us on the land, so he could see us in the first place, and in the winter he just runs. You heard them telling the children that story, of how we came onto the land. It's a good story for the longest night, because it shows how wild and foolish the sun is. Did you hear it?
DG: Yes... Why are the doctors singing to the moon?
w: Why wouldn't they?
DG: You said the sun is foolish...
w: Yes. But they can't sing to the sun, is that what you mean? Almost no one can sing to the sun. You can't even look at him! But the moon can counsel him. They were the same kind of creature once. You heard that, in the story, that he was like her before he came too close to the world in the time before we were here, and set himself on fire.
DG: Yes. So you sing to the moon, and the moon talks to the sun.
w: Right. The moon, she has a lot to worry about. We have our problems, and also the undersea people do, and so do the stars. She's only one woman, and she has to watch us all, like a mother with eight children and eight children again. We don't want to sing to her when it isn't needed, we don't want to be the girl who says she's drowning.
DG: But tonight it is needed.
w: Yes, this is the right time. The doctors on the hill are singing her to tell the sun to slow down when he crosses over us, to be responsible as she is. The moon always walks at the same speed.
DG: They have been singing long.
w: A long time?
DG: Yes, a long time.
w: Well, it takes a while, because they have to sing for the stars' children (i.e. the animals) who are sleeping. They have to sing the sparrows' song, and dance like the rabbits.
DG: Does it always work?
w: [laughs] Yes, it will work. The moon is persuasive. So are the doctors.
DG: You said almost no one can sing to the sun...
w: Yes.
DG: Is there anyone who can?
w: Yes, there's such a thing as a sun doctor. That's a very old thing, you can read about it in the scrolls that were brought from the east. Or you can get the keeper to read it to you. I hear there was a doctor called
máje (Panther Mother)-- that's what he was called afterwards, at least, I don't know what he was called before -- and they say he didn't have a proper father, his father had run away, or maybe was a murderer. And so Panther Mother, he wanted the sun to be his father. Not just as it goes in the story, how the sun called us onto the land, but his father to take care of him. Now, you and I can tell at once that this is foolish. And there is a turning about it, because the sun is where our folly comes from -- oh, I'm ruining the story. Well, this man looked into the sun and pleaded with him, and didn't drink any water, and eventually he heard these sun songs, which were many languages at once. Like a hummingbird's wing is many colors at once, or the inside of a shell, that was these songs. And when he came back to himself he was blind, but they say he could speak every language, and speak to the animals, as the sun can. And he could persuade the sun to do all kinds of things, and could make hot days and cold, and make the seasons longer. Anyway, the other doctors kept him and tried to teach him to sing his songs wisely, but eventually he was just dry inside, and he died.DG: And so you sing to the moon.
w: [laughs] Well, not *because* of that, but yes.
DG: Can we go outside and hear the songs?
w: Do you want to hear them? Even though it's cold outside?
DG: Yes, I want to hear them.
w: Then we shall go.
*
This is how I work out a lot of cultural things, by writing a dialogue between a native and an imaginary questioner.
