Earth Day

There was an article in the NY Times today on DNA samples taken from the Havasupai tribe who live in the Grand Canyon. A rudimentary consent form was given to the tribe to sign, but their DNA was later used for other purposes, which included a study on migrations over the Bering Strait. (Does anybody think that this is news?) As always, some of the "intellectuals" who read the Times wrote in disparaging the people and their stories. I couldn't resist responding. I suppose this is my Earth Day tribute to "traditional" stories—those of the Havasupai and my own ancestral stories. I can deal with it that my own trail of ancestral grandmothers eventually leads back to an amoeba in the primordial ooze. Having a one celled granny in the soup doesn't mean I'm not Anglo-Celtic.

I would ask those people who wrote comments which compare the tribe's spiritual beliefs to "creationists":
Do you know these people?
Do you know their stories?
Do you know their history?
Do you speak their language?
Have you ever danced with your own people, moving together as in prayer? Do you know the stories your ancestors told—hearing them every year so that with each retelling a new layer of meaning is revealed?
Do you know the name of your great-great-great grandfather and his grandfather before him?
Have you visited the place where your great-great-great-grandmother's parents were born?
Can you speak their language?
Our DNA reveal the bare bones of our history, but our stories bring it life.
All the science in the world has still not answered the great mysteries:
Who are we?
Why are we here?
Why did life begin?
That's why we need stories.
Poetry describes what science cannot yet imagine.