James Raymond Wilson
“For the Native American artist, art exists primarily to give form to spirit, and there is spirit in everything one sees.” (Edward Gunts, Baltimore Sun, September 21, 2004)
Rare is the story told simply that transforms despair and the tension of change into joy. Eyes of the Seer flows from the soul and sings through the heart as though all the world were, in a single moment, one harmonious, indivisible life.
He is Appalachian-born, a composer, poet and author of several books, including Gabriel’s Christmas, which is available at authorhouse.com, and a trilogy of historical fiction about the rise and the fall of the Soviet Union soon to be released. The individual titles are Son of the Troubadour, Shadows of the Gods, and Mask of the Theatre. He is a graduate of Gettysburg College and The Peabody Conservatory of Music, and he enjoys reading, fishing, ballet, theatre, and his straw hat. He has been married to the same person for thirty years, and they share a small home with an old cat.
The mystery of Daughter Of The Sky haunted boys because they were forbidden to step upon her sacred ground until the age of attainment and privilege. The deathly conclusions to some manhood journeys enhanced the eeriness of Daughter Of The Sky for her power to control youthful dreams.
White Fox concentrated on his father and brother in the attempt not to dwell on his fears. Chief Gray Cloud and Morning Sun looked strikingly similar from behind. Morning Sun, the leaner of the two, wore a brown headband that White Fox had fashioned a year earlier.
As the final echo drenched the valley with gratitude, Gray Cloud glanced back to his second son and nodded.
White Fox marched up to them, his muscles taut and his mood resolved. The funeral pyre directly below sent a vibration of death skyward. White Fox did not fear death as much as the means. Two years earlier, a manhood journey had been interrupted by a vision so fearsome that a young brave had wedged his lance into a wall of rock and had run himself so forcefully into it that the blade passed through him. A search party had found his body hung on the shaft, and everyone had mourned.
Gray Cloud sat down, his sons after him. The chief was a tall man whose mouth opened wide when he smiled, his cheeks as tight as snakeskin, his ears like big sliced mushrooms. A clever leader, he worked tirelessly to be worthy of his task and to prepare the way for Morning Sun, who was sixteen and a year past his manhood journey.
Gray Cloud removed a white rock from his pouch and drew a large circle on the flat ledge. Near it, he drew a tiny circle. “What do you see?” he said.
Morning Sun frowned. “What do you intend, Father?”
Gray Cloud pointed to the smaller circle, then to the larger one. “That is the spirit of a person,” he said, “but this is the spirit of the tribe.” He waved his hand toward the open space beyond the ledge. “There is the Creator.” He gestured toward the trees behind them, the sacred mountain, and each of his sons, his refrain unvaried: “There is the Creator.” He indicated the departing sun and the knife at his side. “The Creator has no boundaries. Neither treaties nor circles contain the Creator. Treaties protect our needs and the needs of our neighbors. When treaties are upheld, they help us; by helping us and our neighbors, treaties are in accord with the Creator’s wisdom, but they do not judge for the Creator. They do not stand before the laws of the Creator. Treaties are easily broken.”
He eyed each son before he continued.
“We’re told that a tribe is coming that does not understand. We must teach them. It has been said for many generations that we must teach this unusual tribe called the White People. If not, they may destroy the sacred mountain. They may destroy the Mother, which gives us life to honor her and Father Heaven.”
