He who runs with the platypus is no more a man than he who swallows chesnuts

I’d only seen Julius play a few times, but he had that gift, that grace, those fingers like a goddamn medicine man. One time, when the tribal school traveled to Spokane to play this white...

I am weary of your quarrels,Weary of your wars and bloodshed,Weary of your prayers for vengeance,Of your wranglings and dissensions

The yard consisted of grass and a Russian Olive tree, which was about the only kind of tree able to survive on the high prairies. Its thin, grey leaves made it look as though it...

The forces that we deal with have two sides: one is good and helpful and the other is dark and dangerous. Part of your training is to learn to distinguish between them, and know when...

They ravaged neither the rivers nor the forest, and if they irrigated, they took as little water as would serve their needs. The land and all that it bore they treated with consideration; not attempting...

Wherever forests have not been mowed down, wherever the animal is recessed in their quiet protection, wherever the earth is not bereft of four-footed life – that to the white man is an ‘unbroken wilderness.’...

Last night I missed two free throws which would have won the game against the best team in the state. The farm town high school I play for is nicknamed the “Indians,” and I’m probably...

Last summer we had eight people in the [Christian] congregation who danced four different sun dances. Of course the missionaries have said all along that those ceremonies are pagan and we can’t do that. Our...

When you turn around, you’ll see something I bet you’ve never seen before. If it takes your breath away, then you’ll fit in nicely. If you don’t feel anything, then maybe you don’t belong here.

If a child hasn’t been given spiritual values within the family setting, they have no familiarity with the values that are necessary for the just and peaceful functioning in society.

If I want my people to be free, Americans have to be free.

Kinship with all creatures of the earth, sky, and water was a real and active principle. In the animal and bird world there existed a brotherly feeling that kept us safe among them… The animals...

Never has America lost a war … But name, if you can, the last peace the United States won. Victory yes, but this country has never made a successful peace because peace requires exchanging ideas,...

Our nation was born in genocide when it embraced the doctrine that the original American, the Indian, was an inferior race. Even before there were large numbers of Negroes on our shore, the scar of...

Stallions,” Frank said, “they’re fightin’ over a girl. – DANIEL’S ESPERANZA

But undying memories stood like sentinels in her breast. When the notes of doves, calling to each other, fell on her ear, her eyes sought the sky, and she heard a voice saying, “Majella!

A significant number of people believe tribal people still live and dress as they did 300 years ago. During my tenure as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, national news agencies requesting interviews sometimes asked...

Like a man who has been dying for many days, a man in your city is numb to the stench.

We did not think of the great open plains, the beautiful rolling hills and the winding streams with tangled growth, as ‘wild’. Only to the white man was nature a ‘wilderness’ and only to him...

Bad and cruel as our people were treated by the whites, not one of themwas hurt or molested by our band. (…) The whites were complaining at the same time that we were intruding upontheir...

He carried her until he reached one of the hot springs around what became Chapin, and then he walked into the water with her and held her there for three days. He had about given...

Gazing around, looking up at the lofty pinnacles above, which seemed to pierce the sky, looking down upon the world,–it seemed the whole world, so limitless it stretched away at her feet,–feeling that infinite unspeakable...

Though many non-Native Americans have learned very little about us, over time we have had to learn everything about them. We watch their films, read their literature, worship in their churches, and attend their schools....

To understand American Indians is to understand America. This is the story of the paradoxically least and most American place in the twenty-first century. Welcome to the Rez.

I fear you may not be so lucky.

To the untutored sage, the concentration of population was the prolific mother of all evils, moral no less than physical. He argued that food is good, while surfeit kills; that love is good, but lust...

It takes Passion to bring a Vision to Life.

We have flattered ourselves by inventing proverbs of comparison in matter of blindness,–“blind as a bat,” for instance. It would be safe to say that there cannot be found in the animal kingdom a bat,...

They claim this mother of ours, the earth, for their own and fence their neighbors away; they deface her with their buildings and their refuse. That nation is like a spring freshet that overruns its...

I was born upon the prairie, where the wind blew free and there was nothing to break the light of the sun. I was born where there are no enclosures and where everything drew a...

Pulling back, like a savage carnivore at its prey, it tore a large chunk of meat rendering his left arm useless…regardless he did not require it for long.

The true Indian sets no price upon either his property or his labor. His generosity is limited only by his strength and ability. He regards it as an honor to be selected for difficult or...

To look upon that landscape in the early morning, with the sun at your back, is to lose the sense of proportion.

Next time!” In what calendar are kept the records of those next times which never come?

Shit,” he said. “I don’t know why you’re feeling sorry for yourself because you ain’t had to fight a war. You’re lucky. Shit, all you had was that damn Desert Storm. Should have called it...

I want to say that further you are not a great chief of this country. That you have no following, no power, no control.” Logan continued, “You are on an Indian reservation merely at the...

I could see the bay in the distance and where the ship should have been. Instead we found a burnt mast protruding from the waves.

Unearth marvels as you walk the path,Stand in awe,Therein is the joy of life.

They have assumed the names and gestures of their enemies, but have held on to their own, secret souls; and in this there is a resistance and an overcoming, a long outwaiting.

There had been no crises of incident, or marked movements of experience such as in Felipe’s imaginations of love were essential to the fulness of its growth. This is a common mistake on the part...

That’s how I do this life sometimes by making the ordinary just like magic and just like a card trick and just like a mirror and just like disappearing. Every Indian learns how to be...

Allow the power to flow through you. Don’t try to capture it. You wish only to borrow it.

You got what you deserved. Now be a man and confess to what most of us already know.

An old man spoke to his grandson. “My child,” he said. “Inside everyone there is a battle between two wolves. One is Evil. It is anger, jealousy, greed, inferiority, lies, and ego. The other is...

There is a falling from the skyThe sacred hoop is brokenBut different hands with different voiceHear the ancient songsAnd soonAll men will seeThat truth and justiceMustPrevail.

WEST SALEM ~ October 2011A sudden vision, fraught with malevolence and darkness, obscured her sight. The face of a menacing figure turned from the shadows of his grisly handiwork and stared at Sorcha.Her muscles tensed....

I got in a fight with my girlfriend,” I said. “I was just driving around, blowing off steam, you know?”Well, you should be more careful where you drive,” the officer said. “You’re making people nervous....

The wolf turned to Rachel. She was afraid to run, afraid fleeing would make it chase her. Somewhere in the stored files of her mind, she remembered one should not look directly at a menacing...

Cozy was a fun night by a fireplace with marshmallows. Cozy was a grandmother knitting Christmas sweaters. Cozy was new puppies in a litter. Cozy was not what he had in mind to do in...