Carolyn B.

“Once the world was perfect, and we were happy in that world.
Then we took it for granted.
Discontent began a small rumble in the earthly mind.
Then Doubt pushed through with its spiked head.
And once Doubt ruptured the web,
All manner of demon thoughts
Jumped through—
We destroyed the world we had been given
For inspiration, for life—
Each stone of jealousy, each stone
Of fear, greed, envy, and hatred, put out the light.
No one was without a stone in his or her hand.
There we were,
Right back where we had started.
We were bumping into each other
In the dark.
And now we had no place to live, since we didn't know
How to live with each other.
Then one of the stumbling ones took pity on another
And shared a blanket.
A spark of kindness made a light.
The light made an opening in the darkness.
Everyone worked together to make a ladder.
A Wind Clan person climbed out first into the next world,
And then the other clans, the children of those clans, their children,
And their children, all the way through time—
To now, into this morning light to you.”
― Joy Harjo, Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems

“Do not feed the monsters.
Some are wandering thought forms, looking for a place to set up house.
Some are sent to you deliberately. They come from arrows of gossip, jealousy or envy--and inadvertently from thoughtlessness.
They feed on your attention, and feast on your fear.”
― Joy Harjo, Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems

“That, he claimed all reverentially, was what each person there in group had already done: rushed up to overdoses, to freezing while doped up, to crashing a car because of impaired reflexes, to vomiting in their sleep and drowning—addictive behavior was the big-time enemy, couldn’t they see? And the fact that they were all here meant they’d already ran up to it, had already counted coup on it, and gotten away with their lives. The question now was whether they would come back to the tribe proud of how close they’d got, or if they’d go back again and again, until the enemy got its hook into them all the way, left them in a ditch somewhere.”
― Stephen Graham Jones, The Only Good Indians

“If the only good Indian is a dead one, then she’s going to be the worst Indian ever.”
― Stephen Graham Jones, The Only Good Indians