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CULTURE AND THE UNIVERSE
by Simon J. Ortiz

Two nights ago
in the canyon darkness,
only the half-moon and stars,
only mere men.
Prayer, faith, love,
existence.
                       We are measured
by vastness beyond ourselves.
Dark is light.
Stone is rising.
 
I don’t know
if humankind understands
culture: the act
of being human
is not easy knowledge.
 
With painted wooden sticks
and feathers, we journey
into the canyon toward stone,
a massive presence
in midwinter.
 
We stop.
                       Lean into me.
The universe
sings in quiet meditation.
We are wordless:
I am in you.
Without knowing why
culture needs our knowledge,
we are one self in the canyon.
And the stone wall
I lean upon spins me
wordless and silent
to the reach of stars
and to the heavens within.
It’s not humankind after all
nor is it culture
that limits us.
It is the vastness
we do not enter.
It is the stars
we do not let own us.
***
“Culture and the Universe” appears in Simon J. Ortiz‘s collection Out There Somewhere (University of Arizona Press, 2002).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Simon J. Ortiz, an Acoma Pueblo Indian, was born and raised near Albuquerque, New Mexico, grew up speaking the Acoma tongue. After attending Fort Lewis College and the University of New Mexico, Ortiz earned a Master of Fine Arts in Writing from the University of Iowa in 1969. In the early 1970s he began to write in earnest while teaching at various colleges, and in 1982 won a Pushcart Prize and a wide audience with From Sand Creek. His work also includes 1992’s Woven Stone—a spiritual autobiography that blends poetry and prose. (Read more at poetryfoundation.org)

PHOTO: “Stars over Bryce Canyon” (Utah) by Dana Sohm, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.