#11

And I, to whom a great vision was given in my youth,-you see me now a pitiful old man who has done nothing, for the nation's hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead.

Black Elk Speaks made me terribly sad, but it is a beautiful book. Inside are eyewitness accounts of the Battle of Little Bighorn and the massacre at Wounded Knee. Also inside are Black Elk's monumental shamanic experiences. He was vested with great power and nonetheless saw his people fade away, overrun by the greedy and false Wasichu. The descriptions of his visions are quite interesting for anyone interested in symbolique or altered states of consciousness or spirituality, and its value as a historic document of Native American culture and tradition--and the genocidal campaign to wipe these peoples out--is obvious.