The legend of Miskwedo

Keewaydinoquay

Attention, I will tell a story, a story of The People, a story of Miskwedo, that red-topped mushroom which is the spiritual child of Nokomis Giishik, Grandmother Cedar, and of Nimishomiss Wigwass, our Grandfather Birch.  Listen and learn.
	Certainly this is true, for it was told by our honoured forefathers.  Now this happened in the long, long ago times, many uncountalbe moons gone by and many uncountable trails back, it is thought, at one of the temporary camps during the Great Migration of our people across the continent of Minissah, from the Land of the Sun-rising toward the Land of the Sun-setting, when they were being led by the Divine Megis to out home, to the promised land of Keewaydinaukee.
	There were two brothers, so young that they had not yet received their adult names:  full brothers they were, both sons of the same woman of the Owl clan and of the same man of the Sturgeon clan.  The firstborn was called Elder Brother and the secondborn was called Younger Brother.  They lived alone together (Oh, Wah-ay-eah) for their parents had died bravely aonlng that Great Migration trail.  Oh, Wah-ay-eah!  They hunted the same quarry, ate the same food, and shared all things in peace and harmony -- and that was good.  Ahauw!
	Now one day, at the place about which this story is told, the boys were very hubry, thier stomachs empty.  Since there were mountains in that place, they climbed up the rocky slpes looking for food.  At last they came to a graet cave hight in the mountainside.  It seemed to them that light came out of the cave opening.  An amazine sound, a sound like the humming of uncountalbe bees, was heard.  Very carefully and very quietly the brothers approached, curiously peering through the opening.  They saw a beartiul meadow in which there grew many tall red and white mushrooms -- handsome wafaskwedeg they were -- turning and revolving, buzzing and murmuring, singing a strange song of happiness under a brilliantly sunny sky.
	Quck as a flash of lightning, Younger Brother scrambled though the opening running with joyous abandon into the meadow of murmuring mushrooms.
	"Sopt!  Wait!  Stop!" called Elder Brother.  "We do not know what Spirits there are in this place.  We do not know what they might be."
	But Younger Brother did not stop.  He was, in fact, already gone!
	Younger Brother ran to the tallest, strongest, reddest, most handsome mushroom of them all.  White fluffs, like tuft feathers of the finest warbonnet, waved across its shining cap.  Streamers of filmy white, like frills of coulds, swirld in hrythm as it revolved.  Elder Brother watched aghast as Younger Brother becaume fused to that giant mushroom's tipe.  He beheld Younger Brother begin to grow a bright red cap.  At first slowly, then faster and faster, Younger Brother began to spin in the sun.  Elder Brother was horrified.  Quickly he noted the lacation of the giant mushroom and the position of the little mushroom which had once been his Youner Brother.  Then he ran.  he ran as fast as his legs would carry him, away from the bewitching meadow, away from the great cave, away from that awfulholde in the mountainside.  Back down the winding trails, back down the rocky slpes, he ran, nver pausing until at last he came to the village.
	"Awooheee!"
	He gave the emergency call for the elders and the medicine people.  Quickly he toldt them everything that had happened.
	"What shall I do?"  he beged.  "Tell me, Wise Ones, how to save my little brother."
	The elders and the medicine people looked at each other.  They shook their heads.
	"We have nevger heard of such a thing," They said.  "We must ask the Drum."
	When they had consulted the Drum, which was Medicine Drum, they said, "We have an answer, but it is a difficult one.  This is whast you must do.  You must remember every world.  You must go to that place called "The-Place-of -the-Magic-Sands".  It is a high cleff along the lake with a talus slope and great waves pounding the rocks into the sand.  Thre you should collect the magic sands, Onoman.  Put them in a deerskin bag with sacred tobacco and pull the drawstring tightly.  Think a prayer of thanksgiving to the Spirits of that place for their making of Onoman (the magic sands).  Continue running along the trail until you come to "The-Place-Where-the-High-Trees-Grow-and-the-Eagles-Nest".  Find the highest tree and the nest of the largest eagle.  He is a Thunderbird.  You must obtain four feathers from his tail.  Think to the Thunderbird a prayer of thanksgiving and petition as you keep on running toward the mountain.  Follow the sme trail to where the light of the gret cave shimmers through the opening in the side of the mountain.
	"Now face the East with the eagle feathers in your hand, asking Gitchi Manitou's blessing on them.  Obswerve which mushroom is the tallest, strongest and the handsomest.  He is the chief.  With utmost speed enter the witching meadow, thrust an eagle feather through the stipe of the chief.  He will stop turning.  Now locate the wisest Meskwedo among them, the eldest mushroom who is sporulating, the one with the most influence.  As fast as you can, put an eagle feather through the stip of this mushroom.  He, too, wiill stop turning.  Now the third eagle feather must be thrust through the stip of the mushroom which you know to be Younger Brother.  Then dump the bag of magic Onoman all over him.  Carefully remove everyt bit of this mushroom from the shining cap to the bulb at the foot.  Do not break off any particle or a part of Younger Brother will be broken too.  Carrying the mushroom with you, hurry through the opening in the mountain.  Stop just long enough to place the last protective eagle feather across the opening of the cave, then continue down along the trail as fast as you can go.  This is wgat yu are supposd to do.
	"As you run away from that mountain, the load (your "Brother" mushroom) will become heavier and heavier, until finally, it will become as it was in the past.  There will be your Younger Brother running beside you.  But though you recognize him as being there, as he once, was, do not speak, do not stop!  As you run, it will become more and more as it was in the past, except for ohe thing -- an eagel feather will prtrude from Younger Brother's skin.  There it must al;ways remain."
	All these things occurred then.  They happened as it was foretold they would happen.  Elder Brother remembered clearly every little thing.  He did exactly as he was told, collectig the magic sands and the eagle feathers.  He went through the hole in the side of the mountain, placing the prtective eagle feathers and dumping the magic sands over Younger Brother.  He rescued Younger Brother, who seemed to become as he was in the past -- except for one weird thing:  an eagle feather stuck out strangle from his skin just s if it had grown there!  Together the boys ran swiftly down the trail, back to the cmp of The People.  There they lived once again, in the same lodge, in peace and harmony.  And that was good.  Ahauw!
	Many days and mnay nights went by.  Slowly matters began to change.  Wah-ay-eah.  Elder Brother arose inthe mornings, his heart heavy with sadness and foreboding.  He worried and he worried and he was unhappy.  Wah-ay-eah.  Younger Brother, on the contrary, arose smiling each day, his heart filled with happiness, his lips singing merriment.  Ahauw, Zahwendahmowin!
	Now Elder Brother noticed that Younger Brother whent very frequently behind the wigwam to urinate.  He stayed much lionger than seemed to be necessary, and particularly, at the full fo the moon, he stayed a long, long time.  At last Elder Brother, who disliked playing the spy, decided that for his brother's welfare he simply must investigate.  So he went tout behind the wigwam and discovered, just as he had thought, Little Brother was not urinating.  He hd already gone down the trail further into the woods.  Elder Brother followed secretly until he came to a clearing.
	What dows he behold?  There he sees Younger Brother standing in the ceter of an open space, a large group of people around him.  Younger Brother's arms are open wide, spread like the umbrella of a mushroom.  His robes are beautiful, glowing red, and tufts of white feathers adown his head.  In a high, humming voice of happiness, like the song of uncountable bees, he sings to The People.

	"Because of my supernatural experience,
	In the Land of the Miskwedo,
	I have a cure to alleviate you ills,
	To take away all your unhappiness.
	If only you will come to my penis
	And take the quickening waters flowing from it
	You, too, can be forever happy."

	Every time the clouds darken the moon, he urinates.  The peopoe catch his urine in monkukeg, birch bark containers.  They drink this liquid that has been given to them as a great boon by the Miskwedo spirits.  All the members of the mushroom cult, all the debotees of Miskwedo, Youger Brother, who is the chief mushroom, the drum chief, the three elders and three sets of lesser people sing their happy songs, their hearts are strong, and each one does the work of ten.
	Wah-ay-eah, poor Elder Brother!  He did not understand the ways of the red-topped mushroom.  He did not understand the use of the golden mushroom.  He did not understand the use of the golden mushroom liquid and the penis elixir.  He continued to be filled with foreboding.
	"Nothing good an comeof it," he lamented.  He troubled, he worried, and he was unhappy.  Oh Wah-ay-eah.
	Neither did Younger Brother undestand the workings of the Sacred Mushroom.  But he went on being happy, and all the people following him continued in a state of bliss
	And so it is and so it continues to this very day, now at this place and this time, as it was then, and shall be in the future.  All the people who are OLDER BROTHERS, like Elder Brother in our story, because they do not understand, they are unhappy.  They trouble, they worry, and they fuss.  Neither do the YOUNGER BROTHERS odf this world understand, yet stil lthey drink the golden mushroom wathers and are happy.  They drink the Elixir of the Great Miskwedo, and much  is revealed of the supernatural and other knowledge in this way.  It is the Kesuwabo -- the liquid Power of the Sun -- Kesuwabo.  Aahauw!  Jahwenda-mowining, ahauw!

Keewaydinoquay is an Anishinaubeg medicine wonan and storyteller.