It’s been about a year since thousands of people arrived a day from all over the world to join the Standing Rock Sioux on the Dakota plains to protect the Missouri River. The camps are gone now, but the awakening to protect the water, land, and tribal sovereignty continues in Oceti Sakowin territory.
But first, people had to heal.
Last week, I joined the Mní Wičoni Healing Gathering near Porcupine Creek in the Standing Rock Nation. The water protectors returned. Those who had spent time over the past year in this place creating community, praying, protesting traveled from distant places to once again pray, laugh, and heal. I personally was in need of this medicine and was grateful. For over half a year, I documented the opposition to the Dakota Access pipeline and wanted to see how other folks were doing. This time around, the energy was reflective. It felt like the end of a chapter, and a transition to new front lines. The fire at Oceti Sakowin taught us that, in fact, we carry its flame within us and that there is no turning back.
CEREMONY: When you arrived at Oceti Sakowin, security at the gate would say, “Welcome home.” In this way, every person that entered camp was entering their own ceremony. Some came for a couple of days or stayed for months. Some never left. The ground and the sky there were home to their prayers. Ancestral and modern. And just like that, some warriors were born.MNÍ WIČONI: Elders said that in order to be one with everything, one must be willing to make a sacrifice: flesh, fasting, or light. Without water, there is no life. The seeds we offer now will grow in seven generations. What if we could heal with clean water and restore our natural ways of life? These are the questions I don’t want our grandchildren to have to ask when the Earth is dry.1492: The day we die, we take nothing with us. No home, no money, no car. We will leave this existence free. But in the meantime, we must fight with our prayer, our voices, and our bodies.OYATE: The people. A nation. These concepts come in many forms. Ourselves, our family, and our community. The inner circles are the priority, and that’s where true power comes from.HEALING: So many people speak about the American Dream, but they forgot about the American Holocaust.MEDICINE: We are giving birth to the next seven generations.MEDITATION: The fire doesn’t speak English, Spanish, or French. The fire speaks a language older than our understanding, and in order for us to communicate, we must humble ourselves. The fire never ends because it is lit inside our hearts. Together we are standing strong.
Get NationofChange in your inbox
Independent reporting every weekday. No paywall, no advertisers, no corporate owner. Free, and you can unsubscribe whenever you like.
The Boston ruling halts penalties of $998 a day that DHS says it has assessed in more than 103,000 cases, after finding the forms lacked individual allegations
Mass General Brigham says it has contracted 1,300 temporary nurses, while the union says the system conditioned further talks on a multi-year pay freeze
Forty states have appropriated money for the shift, while New York and North Carolina passed the costs to counties and Arkansas and New Hampshire declined
US intelligence agencies have assessed for 25 years that Iran has no military nuclear weapons program, and Iran has no intercontinental ballistic missile, writes Juan Cole.
COMMENTS