Sacred Bowl of water || Part Two

©2008. Photo and text by Turtle Heart.
I woke up this morning. My old legs were really hurting. It is something that comes and goes. When it comes I remember how much of every human life is spent in pain and suffering. When we are suffering we remember such things. When we are happy who has time to think of compassion?

I eat the fine “white” grapes of the island. As most of the grapes of Italian wine do not come to ripen until late September or even October, I enjoy a small breakfast feast of the last of the grapes of August here on Pantelleria.

I carried my old legs to the pool shown in the photo above. It is the perfect temperature for an aching Otter Boy. Hot. Very hot. Volcanic. Right next to the sea. There seems no one around so I take off my clothes and go in the water naked. It feels really good.

These ancient waters are all free on Pantelleria. If this pool was in AmeriKa it would cost a lot of money to spend time with it. I would probably have to wear clothes. I love Pantelleria.

Peace. Gentle and sweet people. Mediterranean Food, fresh every day. The Sun. The ancient stones and my computer which struggles with a dial-up modem connection. Am I the last guy on earth to get dsl? They have it now in most places on the island but not my little house on the side of an ancient volcano.

Meanwhile the four generations of my little bird families come to my big stone bowl of water every morning to dance and play in the water. I am going away from the island for about three weeks. The water will all go away. I have tried to find someone to stop by and keep the water going for the birds. Our people are lazy and I can’t find anyone to do it, even if I pay them.

The island has done more to bring healing and peace to my body then any other place or time I have known. I did not realize until I got here and was introduced to this sacred peace how beat up I was from the endless Indian Wars that go in in the United States. Yes, I am a bruised and aging old Indian finding his way in a new land, healing from the endless bullshit which marks American life.

My heart is the sacred water. It is there I have found my peace, make my magic, and contemplate the service of one ancient Pipe Carrier out into the arms of the waiting world. I move inside a separate time and space than the harried relations of this modern society, of the cities and the reservations. I have become a friend to sacred silence and have passed well beyond the need for argument or even small talk.

I am the water that feeds
My dreaming river, ocean, sea, even the rain
Soaks me from the inside out. I am never dry.
Flying above the clouds I travel to the land of the dreamers
Waiting for the songs, the hot stones and the drum
Which will test them and deliver them
Closer to their dreams.
I was the one who went and found himself.
I took up my life with my own two hands
And turned it around
Like a stone in the shadows
To face the light
And rest in the sacred water…

©2008 Turtle Heart.