Yankton Indians -- Government relations; Yankton Indians -- Social conditions; Yankton women -- Biography; Zitkala-Sa, 1876-1938
On one occasion I forgot the cloud shadow in a strange notion to catch
up with my own shadow. Standing straight and still, I began to glide
after it, putting out one foot cautiously. When, with the greatest care,
I set my foot in advance of myself, my shadow crept onward too. Then
again I tried it; this time with the other foot. Still again my shadow
escaped me. I began to run; and away flew my shadow, always just a step
beyond me. Faster and faster I ran, setting my teeth and clenching my
fists, determined to overtake my own fleet shadow. But ever swifter it
glided before me, while I was growing breathless and hot. Slackening my
speed, I was greatly vexed that my shadow should check its pace also.
Daring it to the utmost, as I thought, I sat down upon a rock imbedded
in the hillside.
So! my shadow had the impudence to sit down beside me!
Now my comrades caught up with me, and began to ask why I was running
away so fast.
"Oh, I was chasing my shadow! Didn't you ever do that?" I inquired,
surprised that they should not understand.
They planted their moccasined feet firmly upon my shadow to stay it, and
I arose. Again my shadow slipped away, and moved as often as I did. Then
we gave up trying to catch my shadow.
Before this peculiar experience I have no distinct memory of having
recognized any vital bond between myself and my own shadow. I never gave
it an afterthought.
Returning our borrowed belts and trinkets, we rambled homeward. That
evening, as on other evenings, I went to sleep over my legends.
IV.
THE COFFEE-MAKING.
One summer afternoon my mother left me alone in our wigwam while she
went across the way to my aunt's dwelling.
I did not much like to stay alone in our tepee for I feared a tall,
broad-shouldered crazy man, some forty years old, who walked loose among
the hills. Wiyaka-Napbina (Wearer of a Feather Necklace) was harmless,
and whenever he came into a wigwam he was driven there by extreme
hunger. He went nude except for the half of a red blanket he girdled
around his waist. In one tawny arm he used to carry a heavy bunch of
wild sunflowers that he gathered in his aimless ramblings. His black
hair was matted by the winds, and scorched into a dry red by the
constant summer sun. As he took great strides, placing one brown bare
foot directly in front of the other, he swung his long lean arm to and
fro.
Frequently he paused in his walk and gazed far backward, shading his
eyes with his hand. He was under the belief that an evil spirit was
haunting his steps. This was what my mother told me once, when I
sneered at such a silly big man. I was brave when my mother was near by,
and Wiyaka-Napbina walking farther and farther away.
"Pity the man, my child. I knew him when he was a brave and handsome
youth. He was overtaken by a malicious spirit among the hills, one day,
when he went hither and thither after his ponies. Since then he can not
stay away from the hills," she said.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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