From the Papago Ceremony for Bringing Rain


And somewhere along the way I stopped again
And it was my cloud that reached me
And it was sprinkling wetly
And here I reached your rainhouse and I looked in
There lay many winds, there lay many clouds,
there lay many seeded things
And you set them down and sat upon them
And with them I touched you
And you moved and breathed your wind
And with it were doing many things
Here you dropped it upon my land
And with that my land was sprinkled
with water and was finished.


From When it Rains: Papago and Pima Poetry edited by Ofelia Zepeda, University of Arizona Press, Sun Tracks Vol. 7, © 1982 Ofelia Zepeda.

This poem is also available in the 'O'odham language.

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