Throughout this section you can move around by looking for these
symbols. Just click the PEACEPIPE to return to this section, or my
PAW to go all the way back to the beginning. The TOTEM CARDS
above each lead to their respective pages.

How can you buy the sky?

How can you own the rain and the wind?

My mother told me,

every part of this earth is sacred to our people. Every Pine needle. Every sandy shore.

Every mist in the dark woods. Every meadow and humming insect. All are holy in the memory of our people.

My father said to me,

I know the sap that courses through the trees as I know the blood that flows in my veins.

We are part of the earth and it is part of us.

The perfumed flowers are our sisters, The Bear, the Deer, the Great Eagle, these are our brothers.

The rocky crests, the meadows, the ponies ~ all belong to the same family.

The voice of my ancestors said to me,

the shining water that moves in the stream and the rivers is not simply water,

but the blood of your grandfather's grandfather. Each ghostly reflection in the clear waters of the lakes

tells of memories in the life of our people. A water's murmur is the voice of your great-great-grandmother.

The rivers are our brothers. They quench our thirst. They carry our canoes and feed our children.

You must give to the rivers the kindness you would give to any brother.

The voice of my grandfather said to me,

the air is precious. It shares its spirit with all the life it supports.

The wind that gave me my first breath also recieved my last sigh.

You must keep the land and the air apart and sacred,

as a place where one can go to taste the wind that is sweetened by the meadow flowers.

When the last Red Man and Woman have vanished with their wilderness,

and their memory is only the shadow of a cloud moving across the prairie,

will the shores and forest still be here? Will there be any of the spirit of my people left?

My ancestors said to me,

This We Know:

The Earth does not belong to Us, We Belong to the Earth

The voice of my grandmother said to me.

Teach your children what you have been taught. The Earth is our mother.

What befalls the earth befalls all the sons and daughters of the earth.

Hear my voice and the voice of my ancestors; The destiny of you people is a mystery to us.

What will happen when the buffalo are all slaughtered? The wild horses tamed?

What will happen when the secret corners of the forest are heavy with the scent of many men?

When the view of the ripe hills is blotted by talking wires? Where will the thicket be?

GONE!! Where will the Eagle be? GONE!!!

And what will happen when we say good-bye to the swift pony and the hunt?

It will be the end of Living and the beginning of Surviving.

This WE know.

All things are connected like the blood that unites us.

We did not weave the web of life, we are merely a strand in it.

Whatever we do to the web we do to ourselves.

We love this earth as a newborn loves its mother's heartbeat.

If we sell you our land, care for it as we have cared for it.

Hold in your mind the memory of the land as it is when you receive it.

Preserve the land and the air and the rivers for your children's children and love it as we have loved it.

~ from Chief Seattle (cir: 1850): This was the Native American's address to the Government of the United States,
in Washington D.C. when the White Man's politicians wanted to buy the Northwest Indian Nation's native lands.

YOU WANT US TO DO WHAT !?!?

I felt that the greatest way to open up this portion of my website would be to remind you
of something someone else had said, many, many years ago. But who's words still ring
out, and the truth within becomes clearer and clearer with each passing day. What you
are about to read is actually a historical piece and was recorded by Dr. Henry A Smith
for transcription into the Library of Congress's Records in 1790-1866.

His words were not understood in thier time. Now they haunt us................

Now they have come true! Now before it is too late to undo the damages we have
wrought, we must listen at last to the truths they told to us then and again find our
connection to the sacred earth.

To every Native American people every creature and every part of the earth was, is
and shall ever be sacred. To waste or destroy nature and its wonders is to destroy
life itself.

Do unto Nature, as you would it, do unto you.

~ Treehawk ~