Waiting for wovoka, p.6
Waiting for Wovoka, page 6
Basile created dream songs and stories of natural motion, and his brother perceived the natural blue hues and shimmer of ravens. Aloysius never painted black ravens despite the godly rave of the mission priest who favored unnatural and demonic black, black, black. The Great War incited mockery of dangerous and clumsy commanders, but he painted some miniature scenes in combat, and later he created spectacular abstract scenes of blue ravens at the Café du Dome in Paris. Pablo Picasso was pictured as a blue raven with a huge cubist beak. Guillaume Apollinaire was portrayed as a giant melancholy raven on the Pont Mirabeau over the River Seine.
Aloysius was a visionary painter of natural motion, abstract waves of color, contours, and shadows, and was inspired by the original native images on stone, hide, bark, and the untutored native ledger artists who were held as political prisoners at Fort Marion in Saint Augustine, Florida. Later he was inspired by the ethereal blues in the magical scenes painted by Marc Chagall.
Aloysius was thirteen years old when he first painted blue ravens, abstract ravens in natural motion on flimsy newsprint provided by The Tomahawk, an independent newspaper published by his uncle Augustus Hudon Beaulieu. Aloysius and Basile were hired by their uncle to hawk the weekly newspaper at the Ogema Train Station.
Aloysius never thought about painting the blue flies on the dead bodies of combat soldiers and only envisioned blue ravens in the birch trees, cemetery monuments, and telegraph wires on the reservation. Mostly he mourned the absence of any birds on the decimated battlefields of France. Months later at the end of the war he painted abstract blue raven scenes at famous bridges over the River Seine. In one painting he created stone bastions near the Pont Neuf with great abstract ravens on enormous crests of white and blue river waves. Aloysius revealed at the gallery exhibition that he was inspired by The Great Wave, the famous woodblock by Katsushika Hokusai. Nathan scheduled an exhibition of his most recent paintings, Trente Six Scènes des Corbeaux Bleus, Thirty-Six Scenes of Blue Ravens, at the Galerie Crémieux in Paris.
Aloysius continued to paint en plein air during the Nazi Occupation of France. His abstract ravens soared in visionary scenes with the minimal wash of blue wings and traces of rouge in a new style of totemic fauvism. Nathan named him the native resistance envoy of blue totemic ravens in the monstrous world of nationalists, deadly collaborators, and devious cringers of the Vichy Regime.
The generous sense of natural motion in his abstract blue ravens changed to fractured images of totemic animals and birds four years later at the end of the Nazi Occupation of Paris. The strange ruptured bones, claws, paws, twisted wing feathers, contorted motion of ravens, fractured and cubist faces of beaver, bear, marten, wolf, fox, river otter, golden eagle, and many other totemic animals and birds of the fur trade were created for the exhibition Totemic Custody and Casualty, along with the solemn display of Ghost Dance shirts at the new Galerie de la Danse des Esprits, Galerie Ghost Dance, established at the end of the war by Nathan Crémieux.
Aloysius returned to the reservation, and once again, he was obsessed with the sway of trees and shimmer of colors on Bad Boy Lake. For more than a month he waited in silence on the shoreline to observe the slightest breeze over the lake, the creases and eddies of natural motion, and the traces and abstract hues of the seasons. He created more than thirty new abstract scenes of the lake in natural motion, the wild colors of totemic chance. The new watercolor scenes were much larger than his previous paintings.
Dummy wrote on the inside chalk board, “Aloysius has created that totemic chance of a blue dance of natural motion in the eyes of honeybees and hummingbirds.”
By Now Beaulieu and Prometheus occupied a cozy cabin nearby on the shoreline of Bad Boy Lake. They heard the slow sound of waves at night, the laughter and plaintive sing out of loons, and the steady thump, thump, thump of moths on the window. The dilapidated cabin was a native sanctuary for the two resistance warriors with their memories of the occupation and an escape distance from enemy soldiers at every corner of memory. The morning light bounced in the white pine, maple, and birch, and the shadows wavered in the cabin as the natural motion of liberty.
The new hand puppets were polished and decked out with coats and capes a few days later and prepared for the overnight summer parley around a bonfire. The four stowaways created and rehearsed the colloquies for the puppets, and the mongrels were at the ready to moan, groan, bark, yodel, bay, and bounce with every gesture of the hand puppets.
The fire circle parley was carried out once or twice every summer on a spectacular meadow of panic holes created by the Baron of Patronia, the dauntless native who counted with giant steps a federal land grant in his name and declared the natural meadow of panic holes and curative shouts the outright sway of chance and native liberty.
The Baron of Patronia has buried his solemn shouts in seven panic holes for more than thirty years, one for each distinct pose, mood, manner, temper, and fury of resistance to cultural fakery, promissory missions, outright misery, and the predatory state of greedy governance on a federal treaty reservation.
He shouted into the first panic hole to bury the steady rage over the mercenary fur trade and ruins of totemic solidarity. His temper and shouts over the poseurs of native traditions and the carousel of feigned political creation stories were buried in the second panic hole. In the third panic hole he buried the eternal anger over the plunder of white pine by federal agents and timber barons. He buried great shouts of sorrow over native suicides in the fourth panic hole. His wrath over native want and starvation on the reservation was shouted year after year into the fifth panic hole. He shouted in the sixth panic hole over the absence of mockery and irony in new native stories. The seventh panic hole was reserved for his great fury and resistance to the seductive snow ghosts.
Dummy teased the Baron of Patronia in a song poem and passed the chalk board around the bonfire. Big Rant leaned closer to the fire and read the concise poem out loud.
baron of patronia
shouts out and never pouts
favors panic holes
great meadows of native liberty
buries missions of misery
Native shouts and panic holes were necessary to heal the heart, and the shouters became stronger storiers in the sway of liberty. Bad Boy shouted into panic holes to heal his anger and shame, and then turned his shouts into creative stories of burned books. Poesy May once circled the old panic holes and heard the eerie native echoes of betrayal, of cultural humiliation, and fury, but the distant wavers of shouts were clumsy, seldom poetic, and since then she has only returned to the meadow of panic for the summer hand puppet parleys.
Master Jean should have shouted out his rage into a panic hole when his mother was diagnosed with tuberculosis and sent to the Ahgwahching State Sanatorium. Bunker Boy might have mocked the scriptures of hope, shame, separation, and shouted into more than one panic hole, and outlived the cowboys and snow ghosts to create his own outrider puppet parleys at the Theatre of Chance.
Dummy raised Prometheus on her right hand and Dummy the puppet on her left hand. The great fire created shadows that danced on the polished faces of the puppets. Prometheus turned his head from side to side and gestured to everyone in the circle. The hand puppet leaned down and pretended to shout into a panic hole near the circle of fire. Trophy Boy moved closer to the circle, raised his head, and almost shouted his bay. Dingleberry danced around the fire and yodeled. George Eliot turned her head to the side and moaned with the mercy of a great soprano diva. Dummy the healer was heard once more in the bold voice of Big Rant. Bad Boy was the modest voice of the gentle hand puppet Prometheus.
DUMMY: Greek gods must have concocted nicknames.
PROMETHEUS: By Now is one of the great nicknames.
DUMMY: She created many nicknames and heart stories.
PROMETHEUS: Greek gods were never my natives.
DUMMY: Almost Native and Just About are nicknames.
PROMETHEUS: Celebrity of Nothing was my name.
DUMMY: Nothing is a tease and an ironic nickname.
PROMETHEUS: By Now named me About Time.
DUMMY: Yes, about time she found you a nickname.
PROMETHEUS: About Time and Celebrity of Nothing.
DUMMY: By Now teases everyone with a nickname.
PROMETHEUS: Heart storiers always create the way.
DUMMY: By Now rode Treaty to Capitol Hill.
PROMETHEUS: Rightly honored in two world wars.
DUMMY: By Now was born a maestro of mockery.
PROMETHEUS: My father was an artist of mockery.
DUMMY: Mockery is the chancy art of resistance.
PROMETHEUS: Count on me as a chancy raconteur.
DUMMY: The Theatre of Chance is our native liberty.
PROMETHEUS: By Now was my chance of liberty.
DUMMY: Native chance is our sense of presence.
PROMETHEUS: Le Corbeau Bleu to Sanary-sur-Mer.
DUMMY: Place de Grève to Oradour-sur-Glane.
PROMETHEUS: By Now liberated soldiers with teases.
DUMMY: Another tricky catch at the Theatre of Chance.
PROMETHEUS: Resistance is our chancy liberty.
Basile Hudon Beaulieu was almost shied when Dummy presented a bundle of fifty letters that he wrote to the heirs of the fur trade over thirteen years. The yellowy newsprint letters were printed on the old rotary press of The Progress and The Tomahawk and given away at the post office, government school, Ogema Train Station, and at the Leecy Hotel.
Big Rant slowly read out loud from the letter “Celebrity of Nothing” dated November 2, 1940. “Prometheus was actually a raconteur of futurity and celebrity of nothing, as his stories of exile created a sense of motion rather than destiny. He assumed from the name on the side of the van, our faces, and gestures, that we were natives, and with that assurance he slowly climbed into the back of the van, and at once related an elusive story about a native named Ishi.”
Prometheus waited that early morning near the corner of Rue de la République in Bandol on the Côte d’Azur for a chance ride to Marseille when native puppeteers in a large van named Les Marionnettes Bleues pulled over near the lamppost to admire the spectacular height of the raconteur, more than seven feet high, who wore bizarre clown clothes. He was an apatride or stateless raconteur from East Frisia in the Netherlands on his chancy way to California.
Prometheus was nosed by the mongrels, and when the wild operatic moans and bays slowly ended, everyone gathered around the fire circle and celebrated the raconteur as a favored stowaway at the Theatre of Chance.
Irene Martin Vizenor, manager at the Ponsford Post Office and former reservation schoolteacher, was at the puppet parley. She was an advocate of education and the trust of native stories as the source of irony and native wisdom. Postcard Mary and many other natives were at the parley, including the librarian Harmony Baswewe, Carmen Bear with an outlier surveyor at hand for the night, several teachers, students, and three curious anthropology graduate students from the University of Minnesota.
Dummy circled the fire and raised By Now on her right hand and the Baron of Patronia on her left hand. The mongrels were at her side, and the fire flashed in their eyes. Big Rant was the bold voice of By Now. Master Jean delivered the rush and dramatic shouts of the Baron of Patronia.
BY NOW: Native rage is buried in panic holes.
BARON: Creation stories are shouts, never whispers.
BY NOW: Shout out the great names in native history.
BARON: Hole in the Day shouted in many panic holes.
BY NOW: Shamans shout tricky cures to the clouds.
BARON: Shouts last and dream songs float away.
BY NOW: Snow ghosts are chased away in panic holes.
BARON: Thousands since the horror of the fur trade.
BY NOW: Millions of native shouts buried in the earth.
BARON: Flowers bloom on the meadow of panic holes.
BY NOW: Some natives shout at the fish in ice holes.
BARON: Frozen shouts melt away with the season.
BY NOW: Every native must shout into a panic hole.
BARON: Everywhere the earth waits for our shouts.
BY NOW: Natives in the city shout under bridges.
BARON: Panic holes are in parks and church yards.
BY NOW: No panic holes on the fur trade routes.
BARON: Totemic animals shouted into panic holes.
BY NOW: Shamans and wolves shout at full moons.
BARON: Shouts about the snow ghosts of suicide.
BY NOW: Bunker never shouted into a panic hole.
BARON: Seduced by shame and the snow ghosts.
BY NOW: Dummy shouts in silence on the page.
BARON: Silent shouts are heard in heart stories.
BY NOW: Dream songs are her silent shouts.
BARON: Some heart stories are silent panic holes.
BY NOW: Ready to shout into a panic hole of fire.
BARON: The rage of liberty is a panic hole of fire.
BY NOW: Native shouts of resistance and liberty.
The Baron of Patronia and the stowaways shouted into the fire and the mongrels barked and bayed at the end of the puppet parley. George Eliot raised the timbre of the mongrel moans with a singular soprano bay. Tallulah the beagle mongrel delivered a harmonic contralto bay. Daniel united with the bays and then turned away.
By Now, Basile, and Aloysius shouted their praise for the great puppets and the marvelous parley as Prometheus slowly moved closer to the circle of fire. He wore white gloves and mimed an applause in silence. Trophy Bay followed the giant mime around the fire with a melancholy baritone bay.
Harmony Baswewe celebrated the dedication and silent genius of Dummy Trout and the five stowaways for the great performances, but the praise was interrupted because the parley was not yet over. Bad Boy shouted out that there was one last hand puppet parley. Prometheus and the mongrels circled the fire for a surprise parley with the hand puppet Prometheus and a crudely decorated tin cone of Red Wing Premium Beer as the hand puppet named the Trickster of Liberty.
La Chance was the lively voice of the Trickster of Liberty and Bad Boy was the voice of the puppet Prometheus. Together they created and rehearsed the esoteric back talk of the pirate of fire and the native trickster with classical sources from burned books recovered by Bad Boy.
By Now smiled and Dummy raised her hands in silent praise of the puppet parley. Trophy Bay moved closer to the two stowaways and softly moaned. Tallulah sneezed with favor, and then bayed. Dingleberry yodeled around the fire and the other chorus mongrels raised their heads ready to moan, bounce, and bark with the performance.
TRICKSTER: You were exiled from an elite democracy.
PROMETHEUS: Yes, more godly temper than ironic play.
TRICKSTER: Treaties were not the work of a Darian League.
PROMETHEUS: Gods favor power, feign hope for humanity.
TRICKSTER: The enemies of chance are hope and pity.
PROMETHEUS: Mockery was my course not stolen fire.
TRICKSTER: Listen to the mongrel as a chorus of chance.
PROMETHEUS: The heroic gods devised a deadly fate.
TRICKSTER: Tricksters steal fire and create ironic stories.
PROMETHEUS: Miserly gods owned fire and lightning.
TRICKSTER: Not the silence between lightning and thunder.
PROMETHEUS: Silence is a chorus of peace and liberty.
TRICKSTER: Godly betrayal and torment in your name.
PROMETHEUS: Only to the pompous gods of obedience.
TRICKSTER: Trickster stories outwit the tyranny of gods.
PROMETHEUS: Poseurs of craft are weaker than necessity.
TRICKSTER: Creation stories are ironies of necessity.
PROMETHEUS: Fascists never escape the furies of fate.
TRICKSTER: The Theatre of Chance counters destiny.
PROMETHEUS: Frisian raconteurs mock the myths of fate.
TRICKSTER: The tricksters tease and imitate noble actions.
PROMETHEUS: Tragedy is the imitation of pitiable action.
TRICKSTER: Shamans play out the poses of insecure people.
PROMETHEUS: Aeschylus revealed the deceit of courage.
TRICKSTER: Chance overturns dominance and shame.
PROMETHEUS: Yes, the gods create a most anxious sight.
TRICKSTER: Do not hide from what must be endured.
PROMETHEUS: Natives dare to care and with no shame.
TRICKSTER: Monotheism undermined totemic stories.
PROMETHEUS: The theft of fire teases the future of death.
TRICKSTER: Dream songs are in the clouds not graves.
PROMETHEUS: Heroic myths of me planted blind hope.
TRICKSTER: Promises are the feigned cultures of nothing.
PROMETHEUS: The myth of my name was never me.
TRICKSTER: The tease of my name must last forever.
Poesy May moved closer to the fire circle and surprised the troupe with a dramatic reading of a short selection from the first act of Prometheus Unbound by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Dummy and the native troupe were delighted because Poesy May was a native whisperer when she arrived as a runaway. She was almost silent at first and then one clear night she pointed to the sky and boldly named the great constellations, Orion, Ursa Major, Gemini, and The Pleiades. Later she created native names for the same three constellations, Waawaatesi, or Firefly for Orion, Nimishoomis, or Grandfather for Ursa Major, and Nimisenyag, or Sisters for The Pleiades.
Poesy May chanted, “the stars move forever and stay, never fade away,” and later she announced the names of great natives, “Hole in the Day, Sitting Bull, Chief Joseph, and Standing Bear, who stay and display as great constellations a sense of natural motion, presence, and liberty.”
She turned away shame, malicious threats, and teases with creative names of the constellation, and she learned to deftly whisper down the churchy curses and wordy abuse of chance with the names of native leaders. Trophy Bay waited in silence for the sound of her gentle voice.
