ANISHINABE ~ ECHOS OF CREATION
Echoes of water down below
Coming close, nose to fin with her, and an ear to hear Megis
Fish challenges raven to give up his light
His light is the kernel of corn in his mouth, in the underbelly of time
This seed contains the first thought, that dream, the essence of life
Raven rests on the roots of a log, in the floods of Nanabush
And he rests beside muskrat and otter who remember the deepness of love
Under the waters are all the animals that depend and know
The beginning of life starts in the power of seeds and soil
Echoes of Water on the surface of dreams
Echoes of living swimming in the mother and her baby cradle board designed with star fish
Mirroring the stars in the sky with of the life of the very old it is remembered on the very young
Balancing the relations water to sky of newborn and night
Up above to down below connecting the stars that light up the sky
She swims beside the whales and the dolphins with the safety of the sedna
The nations that are relations echoed in the stars onto the surface of Creation
Where relations understand connections to what is said in rippled reproductions of the past
Echoes of water all along the horizon of a west wind blowing
And all the directions know their part in her equation
The morning sun rises on the surface of emergence
Spirits awaken out of red skies of glory
And life begins in the watery sun light of a new morning
Echoes overhead in the skies on the wings of Spirit Messenger and Sky Peopled
Anishinabe the first of the male species is lowered by Gitchie Manitou
From the realms of the blue into red
And so it begins again
Floods of waters that keep speaking of a time of cleansing
When the people argued and did not respect a mother’s life
Echoes heard all across the land to the depths within her watered soul
Awaken the ones who see both sides who take that seed and plant it
For generations to come that life becomes in the echoes continued remembered from the first dream.
LauraLee K. Harris
Anishinabe ~ Echos of Creation 48"x48" Acrylic on Fir *(view details)