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It is hard to follow one great vision in this world of darkness and of many changing shadows. Among those men get lost.

Black Elk

Birds make their nests in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours.
BLACK ELK

Birds Nests Religion Same
And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all children of one mother and one father. And I saw that it was holy.
BLACK ELK

Children Daylight Flowering Hoops Shelter
It is in the darkness of their eyes that men lose their way.
BLACK ELK

Darkness Eye Men
As you walk upon the sacred earth, treat each step as a prayer.
BLACK ELK

Earth Prayer Sacred
And when I breathed, my breath was lightning.
BLACK ELK

Breath Country Lightning Native
The life of an Indian is like the wings of the air. That is why you notice the hawk knows how to get his prey. The Indian is like that.
BLACK ELK

Air Animal Country Native
Crazy Horse dreamed and went into the world where there is nothing but the spirits of things. That is the real world that is behind this one, and everything we see here is something like a shadow from that world….
BLACK ELK

Behind Crazy Dreamed Horse Hurt Nothing Real
I was four years old then, and I think it must have been the next summer that I first heard the voices.
BLACK ELK

Summer Thinking Years
And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people as one of many hoops that made one circle.
BLACK ELK

Circles Country Native People
The boys of my people began very young to learn the ways of men, and no one taught us; we just learned by doing what we saw, and we were warriors at a time when boys now are like girls.
BLACK ELK

Boys Girl Girls Learned Warrior
The Universe is circles within circles, and everything is one circle, and all the circles are connected to each other.
BLACK ELK

Circles Community Together
Everything tries to be round.
BLACK ELK

Education Statistics Trying
The sky is round, and I have heard that the earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars. The wind, in its greatest power, whirls.
BLACK ELK

Country Native Stars Wind
So I took the bright red stick and at the center of the nation’s hoop I thrust it in the earth.
BLACK ELK

Earth Red Sticks
Know the Power that is Peace.
BLACK ELK

Inspirational Life Peace Power
And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being.
BLACK ELK

Circles Country Inspirational Native

It is hard to follow one great vision in this world of darkness and of many changing shadows. Among those men get lost.

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It is hard to follow one great vision in this world of darkness and of many changing shadows. Among those men get lost.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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