I
Sköl, the barkeep growled, and sköl the townsmen echoed,
Then clutching at the traveler's arm, old Helen told her story:
In the early mists of time two forces worked in darkness:
Rock, inyan, the first-born one and water, mni, the giver of life.
The spirit moved on the wind the way it willed and there was not day or night.
Rock grew taller in that time and the water it went deeper.
There was a balance in that primal world that we will never understand,
For Creator did not like them side by side, like that, and he mixed them up together.
A great love came in the water then; its name was Gitchi Gummi.
Gitchi Gummi grew and grew as the rock and water combined.
Creator, whose mind is greater than all things and dictates the weather,
Seeing this new spirit spread betwixt the rock and water,
summoned all the three forces near to announce a new design.
I am alone, Creator spoke, and will make a warming sun.
Rock and Water you must separate again to make room for my world of beings on dry land.
Rock obeyed, silently, and moved away, resigned to his fate.
And water tried to do the same, but Gitchi Gummi cried.
I'll not let go, the spirit sang, even if you force me to, which Creator later tried.
Curse your beings and your world, we were perfect the way we were,
Curse your Sun and the heat it brings, and curse your changing mind.
We were perfect water and stone as one and without time.
If you understood the love we made, you would never feel alone.
The Creator is what moves what moves and there is not any other.
Since then the rock and water are apart, except where Gitchi Gummi,
Part lover, part brooding mother, clings to the stone and won't let go.
She dwells deep in this blue water near and Creator does not break her hold.
Creator sang all things into being, the ones that fly and run and swim;
The tree nations, the flowers, the plants and then at last the humans.
But it's Gitchi Gummi, the old ones say, that keeps all beings alive.
Not for them, whom she sometimes blames, but for the sake of a stronger tie.
Gitchi Gummi yearns to combine with rock and water
in perfect harmony, as one, in love, and beyond time.
The rivers and streams and mountain lakes all beckon to her call
And even rock, whose heart has hardened since, will crumble and will fall
All the way to Gitchi Gummi from the heights of the mountains tall.
And now the seer Helen spoke to the traveling man directly.
With both eyes closed she uttered her ghostly warning.
Gitchi Gummi hates most the lover who runs away
in hopes of getting lost, of finding truth, or simply to avoid the pain.
Three curses she holds in store for these,
Be they men of the Woods or the open water.
First is cold, second fog, and third the lonely rain.
Beware, my boy, your wanderlust is clear of any love,
that clings to it from home, my boy, or you have much to fear.
The traveler laughed out loud and slammed his glass down hard.
Good show, great tale, and what a memory, he said,
To recall the very font of time from a stool at a tavern bar.
I'm off to bed, already drunk, and early will I rise.
To climb the highest heights and voyage deep into the Great Northwoods.
As for Gitchi Gummi, well, old Indian tales I love.
The city has filled me to the brim with curses, though,
And I have no need of them.
I came North for the healthy air and to witness the autumn's color.
They say the maples here turn fire red and the lake another kind of blue.
With that he settled up his tab and walked back into the night
To a friendly motel and a tidy bed, the traveler's dream come true.
But after he'd turned out the light and laid his heavy head down,
The traveler could not shake the vision of the girl he left at home.
It was the sight of her loving face and the feel of her loving heart,
That were his last sensations ere he yielded to the night.
II
In the morning the traveler woke with a pain behind his eyes
and drove to the store in the early light to purchase his supplies.
Then to a river called Temperance, which seemed an appropriate place,
To begin to walk away the butterfat, the beer, and the strain of the rat race.
Up and up and up he paced beneath the late fall sun,
Till at last he reached a promontory cliff, and called the morning done.
He gazed out over the red-gold leaves to the wide blue water beyond.
My God, he said beneath his breath, but Gitchi is a looker:
Blue as cobalt, cold as ice, her power hidden deep within.
I like my women dangerous and capable of sin,
Not scared of their own shadows, or delicate as flowers,
Nor intent on any sacrifice for the love of foolish men.
All that afternoon the traveler enjoyed the sportsman's glory.
Shedding with each steep hill he climbed all his city worries.
The sun it shone like gold all day, as it can in the late fall.
The lake, the leaves, and the sheltering sky belonged to the traveler alone
And in that vast silence there was no need for speech.
Along about three the traveler spotted perched high in a leafless tree
The broad winged eagle in his white headdress, and the omen put him at ease.
When evening fell and the shadows grew long, the traveler made a camp,
He ate beneath the twinkling stars feeling very near complete.
Then collapsing in a leg-sore heap, he uttered a contented sigh,
And went to sleep on a cedar bed, dreamless til the dawn.
The second morning the traveler awoke to a find a falling mist.
With aching legs and swollen eyes he prepared himself to walk.
In a mountain place of bright green moss and dark wet stone
He took an aspirin, a sip of tea, and shouldered his pack with a groan.
It was not long, despite the damp and cold, before he worked into a sweat
Pacing north at a natural tilt, a man of muscle and bone.
Around eleven, beneath a darkening sky, the rain began to fall,
And as he walked it rained and rained til the traveler was soaked to the skin.
The traveler walked all day that way, his heart a burning fire,
Stamping out determined steps and savoring the loneliness.
His shoulders forgot their heavy burden and his legs turned numb.
The traveler remembered the peace of the march from his days back in the service.
The trouble with the city life is that it is worry without action,
Each day the fear of failure with never a clear and present danger.
The women with their lowing eyes urging on desires,
The drifters on the corner, a reminder not to tire,
The coppers with their .45s and the captains of industry
Cut figures of the impotence of power, and the brotherhood of fear.
Every movement of the soul strangles the constricting knot tighter.
A free man is never for a moment free; what he has is all he's got.
Not so on the winding path with his things strapped to his back,
The entire forest and the wind itself were the traveler's alone.
The elements and his own weak flesh tested the measure of his pluck.
The more it rained and the more he tired, the more joy seeped into his bones.
The traveler walked twenty miles in the rain that day till he came to Ole's Rest.
And there he made a ship-shape camp fast beneath a Tyvex tarp.
The rain beat out a steady rhythm and never did it stop.
That night a woman came to the traveler in a dream,
Walking like a midnight bride across a causeway through the mist.
She carried a lantern high in one hand and in the other held a mountain rose.
She was solemn in her bearing and patient in her gait.
Her tunic hung open to the waist, her pale breasts exposed.
The woman was so beautiful that the traveler could not wait
For her to reach the place where he stood wanting on dry land.
He rushed into the water, the blood coursing in his veins,
But when he reached the woman and tried to touch her face
The traveler's arm turned to whitened ash and blew away.
A voice came on the wind and filled his head with sound:
What you grasp you cannot hold; and what you've lost you've found
Do not struggle against your love, nor cling to greed and pride.
Lay down in the water, young traveler, surrender to the tide.
III
It rained all through the night, beating a tattoo atop the tarp,
and the traveler woke to a sodden world, sunk in the mud like a carp.
His tent had held away the wet in spite the bog that had formed,
And, taking small comfort from his dryness, the traveler lay in his bed
Considering the morning.
He could stay there wrapped up tight in his cocoon and laze around til noon
Or he could walk the grey wet mountains as he had come to do.
His decision firm, he roused his creaking bones and broke his camp.
All through the morning he walked amidst the hollows of fallen maple leaves
The world awash in water is an amazing thing to see.
It was early afternoon when his legs began to tremble.
He'd walked up four mountains without allowing even a stumble
And still he plodded on, with only the fattening grouse,
To note the extent of the pilgrim's progress or witness his accident.
By the soaked and sullen afternoon, the traveler's legs ached a dull and throbbing pain.
His path, one slippery step at a time, was rock, and mush and all the while the rain.
In that sodden state his mind strayed for a brief instant in the very which
The cut edge of a rock splayed his wavering foot and the traveler was laid flat out on his back
His head separate only by the food at the top of his pack
From the sharpened blade of a steel grey rock.
Chest heaving, the traveler looked up through the hemlock boughs at the sky.
The rain fell. The wind blew. His heart was a white squall.
He screamed out in frustration and no one heard his cry.
Darkness crept into his soul as it creeps, first into each north-facing hollow
And eventually to everything,
But the traveler rose again to walk, his resolution firm,
and sung sad songs of sailors lost in storms, soldiers spitted in foreign lands, and poets feeding worms.
He remembered in that melancholy place his lover back at home
Sitting down by the fire, her hound at her feet, her brown eyes all aglow.
And as he fixed his bearings and rejoined the search for a camp,
A lengthened stride to speed his mission to completion,
The traveler wished he'd favored more, that faithful girl, when she was with him at his side.
It was a fireless camp on that third night. Fires with heat also make light.
And so he crawled into his wet sack, in his wet tent, on that black night, and shivered himself to sleep, thinking of the seer Helen, and her unlucky old wives tale.
The realm of spirits is in the mind, the traveler thought, so find your peace inside.
The power of the seer's story is fed by guilt and brought to life in worry.
You have nothing to hide from yourself or others and nothing for which you need be sorry.
IV
A cruel wind greeted him good morrow, that fourth morning, in the pale and early dawn.
The traveler arose feverish from the fitful rest his wet gear had permitted,
To steel himself and make his tea, and shiver all the while.
Never you mind he told himself, the woods is always a test.
You've been out three days and three nights, the weather's bound to break
The darkest hour the poet reminds is always just before the dawn.
Only those best fit to survive will preserve until the weakness in the flesh is gone away, and in its place, the soldier's strength is born.
An outlander he was, a veteran of foreign wars, and not to be deterred,
Without any further word of complaint to the hoot owl who had joined his camp in the night,
The traveler struck his tent once more, laced his boots up tight,
and walked back onto the forest path ready to finish the fight.
There is only forward and back on a single trail, and only forward
When the decision has been made not to turn back.
The first mountain the traveler ascended was called Despair
For some forgotten cause of human sadness that took place long ago
Or maybe just because its bald grey peak, high above the lake, held its own sorrow.
It was there, looking out into the emptiness of the thick grey fog
That the traveler felt the wind shift to a cold wet northeast gale,
The breath of Gitchi Gummi.
Listen to me you cold blue bitch, he shouted at the void,
I am not the kind to be put off by your ploys.
I defy you Gitchi Gummi and I defy weakness.
Flatlanders, especially the cornfed kind, I despise as a herd of cows,
But this Northwoods lot, superstitious and interbred, are by far the worst.
They make up all this witchy crap to put into your head
sitting in their tavern bars, drinking, muttering, and uttering
About the messages of the moon and the movements of the tide,
to justify their petty gossip and their worthless little lives.
This world is for the living and this is the modern age
Foul water god, the rage of war is all I fear and the cries of dying men.
Whatever the fates throw at me I will press on here.
And know with utter clarity that to rise above the chaos
Of our violent world is the project of courage, chance, and action.
The wind gusted strong up the mountain then, straight from the white-licked foam of Lake Superior's shore,
and knocked the traveler back from the ledge on which he stood.
And when he turned his head to the gale he heard it whisper clear,
Thou art a faithless fool.
Hah, the traveler laughed aloud, may be faithless but not a fool.
He left that peak with courage renewed, and his heart beating strong inside.
His feet stamped out a warlike rhythm to the beat of an ancient drum
Tum, tum, tum, his knees rose and fell on the earth like a machine gun.
The signs of wolf and bear were there criss-crossing the traveler's path.
And in the presence of these stout-hearted cousins, urged on by the birds,
Beneath the canopy of trees, the maple, cedar, spruce, and birch,
The traveler felt belonging, one among many, beyond circumstance and words.
The weather can change on the wind, and the heart can rise and fall,
But the glory of creation has no term of expiration at all.
The rain came and went in squalls all day as the fog crept down the mountains
The world was utterly still and the traveler was alone.
There is a peace in solitude, away from the whirr of voices.
And the traveler noted that love normally comes with so many strings sewed on,
that a man is just a puppet fixed to the stays of loyalty and desire-
The show of freedom as false for paupers as for kings.
Fine philosophical weather, the grey state of mind,
And it was in a blissful way that he settled down to his mid-day repast,
by Clear Creek, brown-rust colored from the fall of a billion leaves mashed to powder and washed fast in the rushing current.
He dropped his dipper deep and drank his fill of the forest's wine.
To Freedom, he said, the truest kind, and to being happy on my own.
He placed his stove and cookpot on a flat spot on the bank
And set to cooking rice and sausage, a feast in good supply.
A man needs only these the traveler thought:
Warm food, quiet, dry feet, a sound body, and a sane mind.
V
He had only wandered twenty feet from his cookshack on the bank
To answer nature's call,
When Clear Creek burst a main and drenched it clean
Taking the food, the cookware and the traveler's peace
In one fell whoosh of the rain-swelled watercourse's fall.
The traveler heard the rush and saw the emptiness left behind,
his gut registered the loss of his hot meal and his pot.
And with a knowing scowl the traveler turned away.
He'd been in worse binds before and the dry food he had in store
Was enough to get him by.
It was a man's mission now, a survival course, and with that knowledge
The traveler set forth again, and took out his anger on his path.
Ringing out his punishing stride upon the rocks underfoot
He overtook his evening's target full three hours before the sun,
That invisible lamp lightening the grey sky, had reached its setting angle.
So on he walked, a fifth mountain, now, another tooth in the saw blade ridge
Of mountain rock that traced the edge of Gitchi Gummi's grasp.
The light grew dim and the path rose steep again through a ghostly grove of birch
And as the traveler climbed the shadows began to mingle with a thickening fog that turned the forest blind.
The traveler missed only one fork in the path all throughout the day,
But that was enough to change his course for good, and lead the man astray.
He battled through the blindness and the ripping mountain laurel
Up and on, and on and up, and found the top of nothing.
At last, his legs spent and his mind near lost, the traveler fell to his quaking knees and hollered to the wind:
Curse this hill and curse the bitch who hexed me in that bar.
Curse the river that took my food, and curse me for being such fool
As to leave my place at home, by my fire and my girl,
To walk this soggy purgatory in the Great Northwoods.
He felt better for the yelling and walked downhill at a yeoman's stride
Determined to find the exit from his hungry, soggy plight.
It was not long before the traveler reached another swollen river's side,
And in the fading evening light he saw a sign to put his mind to right.
A great blue heron, strong and swift, with giant wingbeats pounding
Flew to an overhanging limb, and on it, he alit.
In that frozen moment, regarding the magnificent bird,
The traveler saw a column of thick white smoke, behind the messenger, clear against the fog.
It is in the very nature of humanity to seek out fire in distress,
The traveler, buoyed by hope and faced with a raging river to cross,
Began his new quest by setting down his pack on the east side of the river and looking to the west.
In the obscure light he saw no bridge or passage, so he plodded on upstream along the bank hoping for the best.
And sure enough it was not long before the traveler found a bridge,
A giant cedar, one of the ancient ones, had fallen across the river,
Some two hundred feet across the cedar spanned, and ten full feet above,
The turgid roiling steam that rumbled along below.
The traveler had no fear of heights nor of slipping on the wood,
He alit on the massive trunk and began to pick his way
And in no time at all he had traversed the epic flood.
A moment later, outside a cabin, the traveler hailed from a safe distance,
A traveler, here, wet and cold, in need of some assistance.
A gaudy racket followed, as a chorus of fearsome hounds,
Sang their masters for permission to tear apart the trespasser.
They burst from the door of the hunter's place and waited for the word,
It was a doubtful moment for the traveler then, out of the frying pan into the fire.
The hunter, when he did emerge, spoke a Minnesota greeting
Come up, come in, where the fire's warm and we'll hear your story later.
It's getting dark, dinner's served, and there's no sense in waiting.
If there is a symbol for salvation sent in the guise of humanity
Surely it is food, warmth, and friendship given to a stranger freely.
The traveler peeled his wet clothes off and hung them in the rafters,
There were three hale hunters inside the shack, sitting down to dinner.
Kind masters they were that shared their grouse with the traveler and their hounds.
How quickly can one's fortune change in the fading twilight,
One moment damp, hungry, and cold, then next warm, safe, and fed.
The three hunters, quiet and polite, had hunted the same weekend for thirty years to the night.
The cabin belonged to the grandfather of one and it had stood there in just that way since 1934.
They wished everything so simple, they said, but life's just not that way anymore.
When the traveler had recovered his humor and his color, he asked the men,
By the red glow of the stove, if they knew any long told tales,
Of the Aneshnabe, the Ojibwe, the Chippewa and the lake they called Gitchi Gummi.
The men were quiet for some time, but then their leader spoke.
We are Minnesota men, he said, and Christian folk, and much as we would like,
To know the stories of the Indians we know only what we were told.
We know Paul Bunyan and his Oxen Blue, we know the Swedes and Finns,
We know the Irish and German men who tamed the Great Northwoods.
You are a hearty bunch, the traveler said, and fair to a hapless man,
May all the world bless you three for restoring hope in me.
With that he rose and donned his clothes and walked into the night,
Well-fed and dry, his courage renewed, he stepped out of the light.
The hunters three abreast, dogs still between their legs, watched him vanish down the path and called into the darkness,
Brave Traveler, God's speed, and the Holy Mother's rest.
VI
The hunters' prayers could not stop the driving rain,
but his clothing dry and his body warm, the traveler felt strong again.
For the third night in a row he sought out a dry spot in the wet
And fixed his tent against the cold.
He slept without a dream and for the fourth morning in a row,
Rose again, broke camp, and continued on his way.
The darkest hour is just before dawn, the traveler took the words to heart once more, remembering the despair he'd felt in the fog the day before,
Believing Gitchi Gummi had done her worst, he looked forward to his first glimpse of the sun and took pleasure in the knowledge,
That for the first time since he started walking, his legs were free of pain.
Better still he'd seen the map and knew his path led back to the road,
To the water's edge and an exit from the damp, remorseless hills.
I'll eat in the tavern tonight, he thought, and sleep between clean sheets.
Eat a thick, juicy steak, quaff down some ale, and chat up the local sweets.
Only two mountains lay in the traveler's path, ten miles, 8,000 steps, 25,000 feet.
It was down to simple math: one foot in front of the next for a day would bring the traveler peace.
Round about noon the traveler reached the peak of Eagle Mountain
And as he rested and chewed his lunch, the sun broke through the clouds.
Never was a heart so glad to see the blue of the sky, nor to feel the warmth of the sun,
The traveler turned his grey eyes towards the heavens and considered his fortune.
I came for a test, he thought, in retrospect, and now the test is done.
A bit of suffering in exchange for a message, a trade I'd say I won.
That woman's curse led me astray and I questioned my resolve,
But with a measure of faith in the fairness of things, all earthly doubt dissolves.
Two hours later, from the summit of Mt. Pisgah, the traveler's world was bathed in yellow light.
And no picture, nor even memory, could do justice to the sight,
From the height of that high mountain he gazed out over the lake
At the blue expanse of Gitchi Gummi, the goddess in the water.
I was wrong to curse you, the traveler said, you are more beautiful than anything.
He closed his eyes and felt the sun and the rock beneath his feet.
He thought of his lover once again and her pure, unspoiled heart.
I won't be tied to anything, the traveler spoke, not man, nor woman, nor God.
Sometimes to be together you have to learn to be apart.
But homeward bound I am at last, towards my sweet brown-eyed girl,
And there I'll stay for the next long while until I feel again
The need to stretch my legs and test the boundaries of my heart.
The forest appeared greener still as he walked amongst the ferns
covering the earth beneath the ceiling of maple and birch.
Green is the color of rebirth, fertility, and passion.
The traveler felt a hunger in his loins that intoxicated him.
His pace quickened and he lengthened his stride again.
It did not take the traveler long to reach the Cascade River.
The rain had filled the banks beyond their natural capacity
And the water ripped and roared downstream with biblical ferocity.
Whole trees unmoored, a hundred foot tall, rushed towards the lake like matchsticks.
The path turned downstream there, following a ridge beside the boiling water that flowed to Gitchi Gummi.
The falls roared in a desperate way as they pounded at the rock.
If the legend the seer Helen told is true, the love that rock and water share is violent to its core, the traveler thought, as he watched the water gush.
But what an awesome feeling to feel the mist and listen to the roar.
VII
The traveler was not a hundred yards from the shore of Lake Superior,
When the trail reached the riverside beneath a thundering cascade.
An eddy had carved a deep dark pool below an overhanging rock
And the traveler, perhaps spurred by the exultation of finishing his walk,
Or stirred by a darker force, laid aside his pack and knelt beside the water.
The rock was cool at the rim of the pool, damp the moss and fog,
It calmed the traveler kneeling there and cooled him to his core.
The roar of the mighty waterfall dimmed the traveler's mind,
And the mist that filled the air tingled in his lungs.
For a moment the traveler thought he heard his lover calling from afar,
Her voice desperate in its warning, a memory distant as the war.
But the sound faded in the roar of the mighty cascade,
And the curse of Gitchi Gummi took hold of him again.
The rock was so cool on his tired skin as the water beckoned him near.
He lay his head down on the moss and closed his eyes to rest.
He was tired from the cold, the wet, and the all the loneliness.
It was then the voice of Gitchi Gummi spoke into his ear.
The wet tongue of the mist so sweet, the sound so clear.
There is only one way to love, it said, and no need for you to fear.
Come closer, come in the water, the seer brought you here.
And in that dreamlike stupor, the traveler called to mind,
Blind Helen the local seer, who had spoken of his future,
And warned him of the love he left behind.
I should go home the traveler murmured. I understand now what she meant.
He tried to rise and slipped down further, his energy now spent.
Gitchi Gummi spoke for the last time to the traveler by the water.
One is one and not alone, she said, you weren't running you were sent.
The traveler tried a last time to rise, pushing up to his knees.
A tired feeling washed through him then as he wavered to his feet.
What happened next we cannot know for there was no witness to see.
Whether the traveler slipped and fell or moved more actively.
But the old ones say the traveler washed away and he sleeps with Gitchi Gummi.
Epilogue
And now it falls to travelers everywhere to pass on the tale I've told,
To those who search for simple truths come down from days of old.
All who seek do not seek sorrow, neither do the brave crave suffering.
So sing the Song of Gitchi Gummi and heed the lesson lies therein.
