Redemption

Nobody would be­lieve my story so I am writ­ing it on oak tree leaves and let them float away. I am writ­ing it on the stones near the Lake of Ar­buckles with ink made of tears and the blood of my people.

My story began on the 9^th of Novem­ber 1814 at Tal­lush­at­chee. I was five years old when the Creek War started.

The memor­ies of the last battle had been cut deeply into my heart for so long. I some­times think it was merely a bad dream.

The si­lent death of the Creek war­ri­ors screamed louder than the cries of eagles roar­ing over the bat­tle­field. Wives and daugh­ters fought along­side their men, but it was in vain. The sol­diers were slaughter­ing them all. Mad with des­pair, the wo­men star­ted to kill their chil­dren so that their eyes would close be­fore wit­ness­ing the but­cher­ing of their fam­il­ies. I was one of those chil­dren. I was on the brink of death, but when the one that gave me life tried to put a knife through my heart the Gen­eral snatched me from her. 

I was taken away and raised by Gen­eral An­drew Jack­son and his wife, Rachel, as one of their own.

The vi­ol­ent death I was denied that night has fol­lowed me ever since. Wherever I go, struggle, hatred and des­pair are the friends which would stand by me faithfully.

Old and weary as I feel right now, I must go back to the place where my life as an In­dian boy ended and an­other life has begun.

I have been listen­ing to stor­ies about my tribe. I am try­ing to re­con­nect with my an­cest­ors and find the in­ner peace I so des­per­ately need. Maybe I will find for­give­ness. It seems im­possible right now. I can still hear the eagle cry over the battle, I can still see the bloody wa­ter of the lake and the tear­ful sunset.

I have heard of a medi­cine wo­man who had been liv­ing in the Ar­buckles moun­tains since the be­gin­ning of time. I was told she had un­be­liev­able powers. Of course, I wasn’t sure I would be able to climb and search for her. 

But, the mo­ment my feet touched the ground of my fore­fath­ers, I felt as a kid again. New strength filled my veins. Wa­ter, sky and land: they all re­cog­nized me and greeted me. I was back home.

The wa­ter didn’t have the col­our of blood as it had in my memor­ies and the yel­low stone was glit­ter­ing in the sun. The trees would dance grace­fully in the soft wind and their branches were arms of­fer­ing them­selves to me. 

I fell on my knees and drank wa­ter from the lake. It tasted sweet and bit­ter at the same time. As I drank I heard the cry again, just like in my dreams:

“Cr-EECH Scr-EECH scr-EECH DE DEDEDEDE”

The pier­cing sound of eagles into the sky. A shadow ap­peared on the sur­face of the wa­ter. When I looked up, I saw her. She was stand­ing as still as a rock, as old as the moun­tain, a wrinkled face that I re­cog­nized. She is the guide that helps me find my way out of my night­mares. She wears many faces in my dreams. She is my mother when she wants to make me feel safe, for in­stance. But I al­ways know. 

Speech was not needed. She knew what I wanted. She had been wait­ing for me to return. 

The minute I met the gaze of her huge eyes I was ab­sorbed into a whirlpool.

“This must be death!” I thought “Peace at last!” I felt weight­less and warm, eager to search for my free­dom. I was wait­ing for dark­ness to fill my mind. I ex­pec­ted the peace­ful eternal sleep and a joy­ful meet­ing with my fam­ily in the eternal fields of the hunt. 

Yes, I was at peace at last. I also felt the need to let the world know how happy I was.

I opened my mouth and a strangely yet fa­mil­iar high-pitched sound was com­ing out:

“SCR-EEEEECH”

And then again:

“SCR-EEECH DE DE SCR-EEEEEECH”

The sound re­ver­ber­ated into the moun­tains and re­turned to me strongly first then it faded away…

I felt a deep need to fly and I could do it. I was hav­ing power­ful wings that took me quickly high up in the sky. The sky was so vividly blue, I could see small particles of light fall­ing down and I began chas­ing them, fly­ing among them. I could see the warm columns of hot air that looked like blurry clouds. I would dive into one of the cur­rents and let the stream carry me while I res­ted my wings. I was not a young eagle any­more. The free­dom I felt diving and slid­ing into the air was in­cred­ible. It was as if I had al­ways be­longed up there. 

I looked down. The place that was once my home seemed a vast sea of hues of green. Each tree had a dif­fer­ent shade of green: the white oak was of em­er­ald green, the black oak had a ju­ni­per green col­our while the loblolly pine had the darkest green I had ever seen. I could con­tem­plate the vast scenery be­low me and I could eas­ily fo­cus on spe­cific de­tails. I could see the mid­ribs on leaves, the veins, even the small net­ted veins. My eyes de­tec­ted all the move­ments of creatures in the forest. I watched a tent cater­pil­lar ad­van­cing to­wards a de­li­cious leaf. Its hairy body didn’t at­tract me at all. I don’t think I could eat that. A big­ger an­imal was mov­ing un­der a wil­low oak. It was a rab­bit. It stopped for a mo­ment. In the split of second, I dived like thun­der dir­ectly above it al­most catch­ing it in my claws. The rab­bit froze with fright. But I let it be. I en­joyed fly­ing too much so I flew to­wards the Turner Falls to watch the fish in the wa­ter. Maybe they will make me feel hungry.

I was able to see everything: how alive the land was! Big, small and smal­ler, there were signs of life every­where: on the ground, in the wa­ter, in the air. They all lived in the same space: each of them chas­ing some­thing while be­ing de­voured by a big­ger one. And it all seemed right.

I flew and screeched, and flew some more and screeched again. I was soar­ing over the moun­tains en­joy­ing the touch of wind in my feath­ers. I could per­ceive vari­ous kinds of rocks: lime­stone, dolo­mite, tar sands. Each of them had its col­our and it was vi­brat­ing in a dense rhythm. The rock had trails of metals. The iron ore seemed to be the veins of the moun­tain. It kept it to­gether. I found a good place to build a nest but I was alone. 

I plunged again into the abyss watch­ing the world be­low. I was fly­ing over the place where the blood of my tribe was shed when I no­ticed some­thing strange. There were some heaps of en­ergy like clouds linger­ing over the part of the lake and the land where the slaughter had happened. The col­our was that of blood but it had a dirty dark­ish hue. Those clouds were mov­ing con­stantly without leav­ing that spot, it was like an eternal circle of dark­ness. An­im­als avoided that place, they would go to sip wa­ter in a dif­fer­ent part of the lake. The mas­sacre left trails of its own for all the be­ings to sense. 

I hadn’t known feel­ings like des­pair, fear, hatred and vi­ol­ence left traces. Wrong­ful death formed a dark rain­bow cov­er­ing the place. People would not build homes there any­more. They could not see those clouds, but they still sensed the place was not right. 

Up high as I was, there was no danger for me. I have be­come a danger to others. 

I flew away and screeched some more. Other calls answered me in the dis­tant sky. 

I found my people. They didn’t die. They found a new life nobody would take from them. They were free at last.

One of the eagles joined me in my flight copy­ing my moves. It was like dan­cing. Her cry was softer: 

“Ki ki ki ki – kuk kuk kuk”

We locked our claws and dived like one.

…..

The medi­cine wo­man was sit­ting by the lake. She would touch the stones by the wa­ter and smile listen­ing to things nobody could un­der­stand. When the wind blew, the leaves rustled softly. She whispered to herself:

“The last one has re­turned. The past is re­deemed.” She re­mained there in the twi­light as still as the moun­tain. Her body was mo­tion­less, but her mind was act­ive in the dream world where she was watch­ing the past col­lid­ing into the present. 

(sub­mit­ted Decem­ber 17, 2019)

Elena Petrovan