Rise Up Babylon

Her eyes would widen, “The Black Snake is a human sickness and that serpent represents our insatiable need for more -- more wealth, more convenience, more power. Yes, the Black Snake is about oil, and so much more.”

“The Black Snake is destroying Unci Maka!” Kimi would cry. “The serpent is killing Grandmother Earth.”

But all the insights of Kimi’s teachings of Lakota prophecies couldn’t prepare me for the ruin that came to my own backyard.

I’d just returned from UCLA for winter break. After only three days back at home, my family received a shocking warning -- we had ten minutes to evacuate. There was a wildfire moving quickly on the mountainside to our northeast. With adrenaline pumping through my veins, I grabbed my notebook of songs and threw some clothes into a bag -- and then we quickly drove away from the only home I’d ever known. Our family passed dozens of firetrucks lining our street. I saw flames leaping on the hillside through the backseat window. I remember wondering if our house and my Magic Forest would be gone forever. 

But we were lucky. After four long nights of falling ash and sirens, we were allowed to return to our home that was damaged only by smoke. Many of our neighbors lost everything. I dropped my bag at the front door and then Annie and I rushed to my forest. In traditional fashion we roared loudly, erupting with laughter but then abruptly, tears. Thankfully, my grove had been spared by a natural fireline -- the life-giving water of the adjacent river. But grief washed over us as we looked upon the once oak and pine-covered mountain rising just behind my forest; the entire hillside was charred and lifeless.

Still shaken by the devastation surrounding our home, a few weeks later I returned to my dorm and two roommates at UCLA. 

Kimi ceremoniously lit a candle in our little room and we exchanged stories about our respective winter breaks. I spoke first about the terror of fleeing California’s largest wildfire in modern history. I became emotional speaking about my friends whose homes, pets, and belongings were taken by the flames. I shuddered, “The land around us was still smoldering when I left.” Then my gratitude spilled over, “But the river saved my forest!”

 Hali’a whispered in the low light, “I understand, Maeley.” Then she revealed new details about her family’s ongoing struggle that had begun nine months previously when Kaua’i received 50 inches of rain in just 24 hours. The roads and bridges leading to her town had been washed out. Her loved ones had been cut-off from supplies. Houses, cars, and animals were swept to sea. Farmland and local shops were destroyed. “The road was finally repaired and my parents were just able to drive to work in town again,” she lamented, “but last week there was more rain and flooding and now a different part of the highway has collapsed. My family is cut off again!“ Then she reflected, “We’re fortunate, though. We still have our home.”

We sat quietly with the candlelight flickering on our faces. Then Kimi finally spoke, “My people weren’t displaced by acts of nature. My ancestors were brutalized by acts of humanity.” She then told us about her winter break at Standing Rock. 

“We are defending our lands and waters yet again from the Black Snake. This time it's a pipeline.” She explained the oil companies were excavating under the river that supplies Standing Rock’s drinking water and desecrating sacred Lakota burial grounds. Kimi shared how she and her Unci stood daily in the freezing cold with the other Water Protectors along the banks of the icy Missouri, gathering at night around the fires to pray and sing, “Mni Wiconi. Water is Life!”

As Kimi spoke, shame overtook me, with a thick sickness filling my stomach and throat. My father’s company and its partners were responsible for my beloved friend’s anguish. It was in that moment I realized my own contemptible connection to the insidious Black Snake. 

I flashed back to hearing my father’s phone conversations in the hallway when I was girl, when he complained about the “stupid treehuggers” that stood in his way, preventing him from doing his job.

At Standing Rock, Kimi and the Lakota People stood in my father’s way. His company needed to cross their lands, lakes and rivers to transport crude from its drilling sites to Tricera’s refinery.

In his deathbed confession, Dad finally acknowledged the numerous pipeline accidents and polluting oil spills for which Tricera Oil was responsible. But it was Kimi, not my father, who first taught me “every pipeline leaks.”

The Black Snake was central to Kimi’s storytelling, but she also shared other Lakota prophecies that lifted our despair. With hopefulness, she spoke about Tate, the wind, who will come in the form of a prophet and teach our world how to heal with sound. She fervidly spoke, “Tate will show us how to listen again!”

Kimi, Hali’a, and I learned how to listen to each other by playing music together. We weren't just creating sound, we could hear the silent, soulful space between the notes.

The universal language of music helped us remember — all things are one.

Water is Life

Water is life, she taught me

Water is what gives us life, yea, her ancestors show me

Lakota have a tradition

Of living in whole world relation

All things are one

Have you forgotten?

There aren’t enough ways to say I’m sorry

Crimes against you all made by my own family

I beg to be forgiven

By the sacred Lakota nation

All things are one

My father’s forgotten

Remember, what’s been forgotten

Honor the promises we’ve broken

A prophet heals with sound

So Seeds of Life rebound

As the sun goes down

All things are one

All things are one

The serpent we found deep underground

Will sleep again in silence, sleep again inside us

We’ll sing its’ time, is over now

It’s over now

Over now, over now, over now

Remember, what’s been forgotten

Honor the promises we’ve broken

Remember, this prophecy was spoken

Together, this world we are heartbroken

A prophet heals with sound

So Seeds of Life rebound

As the sun goes down

All things are one

All things are one

All things are one

All things are one

All life is one

Have you forgotten

Have we forgotten

Forgotten