Prophecy

her firewood out back into a pickup held together with baling twine weeks ago, desperate to heat themselves at the wake. "See my nice hair?" she had said to the evening nurse as she stepped through the doorway to replace me. "You smoke?" Prophecy Tenskwatawa—Tecumseh's brother—walks into the circle; in his arms he carries a dead man wrapped in muslin. When everyone is quiet, even the babies, he kneels and gently places the body beside the fire, then raises his arms to the shrouded moon. From around his neck, he takes a string of beads— pellets of flesh—and presses it into the outstretched hands of the closest warrior. Tenskwatawa stops and looks all around. With his good eye, he sees the friends who are gathered; with his blind eye, he sees the friends he has lost. As sparks dance skyward, Tenskwatawa— "The Open Door"—speaks: A nation is coming. The people return. Out ofthe shadows the buffalo leads them. They are the hailstorm that darkens the sun. Cast by the firelight, giant shadows snake through the crowd. To the flickering beat of water-drums, phantoms curve across the lodges; the black feathers and horns of the dancers are swallowed in darkness at the edge of the clearing. —Edwina Pendarvis 82 ...