Appalachian Spirit by Susan McQuiston.

Appalachian Spirit by Susan McQuiston.

This is my home. I have lived here forever. The caves, streams, mounds, and hills sing with me. The winds caressed my mind and body. My soul flies and soars upon it. I hear the sounds of waterfalls and streams, the song of the wind among the trees, the songs of all the people who live here as I do, be they furred or feathered.

I am the soil, of a part of the earth that starts to stretch and roll, rolling gently, then shooting up to the mountains, a place of light and shadow, of tight dark hollows and sprawling gentle hills, that flatten far to the west and north, the plains in full repose.

My blood is pure - the same blood that courses in all of us. It flows with the songs of the Wyandotte, the Europeans, and the African, blood that flows hot and fast. I am a combination of all tribes, be they in the Americas or Europe, Scottish Highlands, the mountains of France or Germany, or a hidden vale deep with Africa.

I listen to the songs of the wind: the chants of the waters sooth me.
I yearn to sing and dance this melody.

I am me.

My ancestors have lived with the land, respected the cycles of life, awed by the lands sacred mysteries. They danced and sang in ritual communion with the Earth and her Spirit. They hunted and planted and herded and rode. Some seasons were good, some dreadful. Every season, some died.
But not all.
Some lived. And so do I.