Michael Motta’s Reviews > Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux > Status Update

"I could see that the Wasichu (non-natives) did not care for each other the way our people did before the nation's hoop was broken. They would take everything from each other if they could, and so there were some who had more of everything than they could use, while crowds of people had nothing at all and maybe were starving. They had forgotten that the earth was their mother."

"'Grandfather, the flowering stick you gave me and the nation's sacred hoop I have given to the people. Hear me, you who have the power to make grow! Guide the people that they may be as blossoms on your holy tree, and make it flourish deep in Mother Earth and make it full of leaves and singing birds.'"

"I could understand the birds when they sang, and they were always saying: 'It is time! It is time!' The crows in the day and the coyotes at night all called and called to me: 'It is time!' It is time! It is time!'
Time to do what?"
"There were many low voices talking together in the east, and the daybreak star would sing this song in the silence: 'In a sacred manner you shall walk! Your nation shall behold you!'"

"How could men get fat by being bad, and starve by being good?"

"First a holy man was sent out all alone to find the waga chun [rustling tree, cottonwood], the holy tree that should stand in the middle of the dancing circle. Nobody dared follow to see what he did or hear the sacred words he would say there. And when he had found the right tree, he would tell the people, and they would come there singing, with flowers all over them."

"He was a small man among the Lakotas and he was slender and had a thin face and his eyes looked through things and he always seemed to be thinking hard about something. He never wanted to have many things for himself, and did not have many ponies like a chief. They say that when game was scarce and the people were hungry, he would not eat at all . . . Maybe he was always part way into that world of his vision."

"I felt sorry that we had killed these animals and thought that we ought to do something in return. So I said: 'Father, should we not offer one of these to the wild things?' . . . He raised his hand and cried, 'Hey-hey' four times and prayed like this: 'Grandfather, the great spirit, behold me! To all the wild things that eat flesh, this I have offered that my people may live and the children grow up with plenty."

" . . . The Wasichus had found much of the yellow metal that they worship and that makes them crazy, and they wanted to have a road up through our country to the place where the yellow metal was; but my people did not want the road. It would scare the bison and make them go away . . ."
". . . The [king]bird spoke and said: 'The clouds all over are one-sided.' Perhaps it meant that all the clouds were looking at me."

"It is the story of all life that is holy and good to tell, and of us two-leggeds sharing in it with the four-leggeds and the wings of the air and all green things; for these are children of one mother and their father is one spirit."