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***WARNING: PICTURES AND DESCRIPTIONS MAY BE EXTREMELY GRAPHIC FOR SOME VIEWERS*** The materials were gathered. Sage, peace pipe, offering bowl, prayer, knife. Goat. We have an oak in the community area that has a strong enough branch. On the edge of the manicured part of the woods, stone lines lead back into the wilder parts. There’s a small cabin, and the road is in sight. There are just leaves and dirt on the ground. The sun is an hour from setting. The breeze is warm.
We smudged first. Nick lit the sage bundle and brought it to me, letting the smoke waft over me. This is an indigenous tradition they call smudging. Cleaning yourself with smoke, essentially. It’s a step of purification, to drain yourself of anything previous and proceed with a clean slate, clean heart, clean mind. I used my hand to bring the smoke into myself, over myself. Sage smells calming. It smells peaceful. I let my mind relax and reflect this. My heart is still beating. I know what we are about to do. I am still nervous. But confident. Nick smudged Patrick next. He did the same. Patrick was holding Steven by the horns. He was bleeting. He knew. Nick smudged Steven, waving the bundle rhythmically along the sides of his body, back and forth. He smudged himself last, getting every part of his body and breath. He sat the burning bundle down in the offering bowl.
I handed him the pipe when his hands were clear. He smoked the tobacco first, and each of us drew breath through the pipe, and breathed it out over Steven. The pipe is a long piece of cedar, the bowl at the end is the hollowed antler of a deer. It’s wrapped in snakeskin and some kind of animal fur. After I brought it back from Minnesota I added the breast feathers of a pheasant and the talon of an owl. When we are done, it will also have a piece of Steven. Nick read the prayer. “When you kill a beast say to him in your heart,
"By the same power that slays you, I to am slain; and I too shall be consumed. For the law that delivered you into my hand shall deliver me into a mightier hand. Your blood and my blood is naught but the sap that feeds the tree of heaven.
And when you crush an apple with your teeth, say to it in your heart,
"Your seeds shall live in my body, And the buds of your tomorrow shall blossom in my heart, And your fragrance shall be my breath, And together we shall rejoice through all the seasons." GIVE THANKS For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun? And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?”
These are the thanks that were in my heart. The words had been spoken. I said Miigwitch because what else could I say? Nick took the knife. He took Steven’s horns from Patrick and walked him next to the tree. He put one leg over and straddled him.
Thank you, Steven. You’ve been a good goat. Thank you. His hand ran over his pelt as he thanked the animal. Steadily, he reached his hand under with the knife, and pulled. Steven’s was not a quiet death. His first reaction was to rear up violently. I was sprayed with blood as animal and human bucked toward me. It stunned me. It was dramatic. My mind blanked, and my body breathed. Nick pinned Steven. Patrick held his back legs and he bled out. After a moment, I knelt to help. The gurgling sound was startling. His death was not instant. But it was not painful. He bled. Part of my brain didn’t process this was real death because the blood was too red, too brilliant to be real. It was the color of ketchup, only flowing and warm. He choked as we held him. It lasted less than a minute. Then the work started. The ritual was complete. Now to the practical. We slit holes next to the knocks in his back legs and slid a post through them. We hoisted the carcass up, threw a rope over an oak branch, and tied it to a nearby willow. The carcass hung in the air, heavy. The first incision was to cut off the lower part of the front legs, snap it just below the knees. That crack and pop made me nauseous for the first time. I was revolted. But then it was over. We moved on. The skin was slit down the insides of his back legs and down the belly. Again the back of the leg just below the knee was cut, but only skin deep. The lower part of the leg was still holding the rest of the body in the air. With skin, because it’s connected to the rest of the body by a connective tissue, you can actually really just rip most of it right off. Nick and I worked to separate the skin from the muscle, my knife and his working in calm collusion. Mine, a first experience. He had done this before. When we got down to the head, we chopped it off. The rest of the skin came off easily. I was continually surprised at how warm it was. My mind expected a dead body to be cold. I took the pelt, scraping the rest of the flesh and fat, laying it flat and covering it in pounds of salt to draw the moisture out. The next task was the innards. We had a variety of pots for sorting. Fortunately, most mammals have their organs contained in a nice little sack. When we cut the belly, most of it just fell right out. Plop. Right into a big bucket. It was just a gray balloon. Some cutting around the rib cage was necessary to get to the lungs, and heart, and liver. We all took and ate a piece of the liver. A few more organs extracted, like the windpipe, which strongly resembled a hookah hose, and we were done. We rinsed the carcass of hair and began to rub it in olive oil, sea salt, and rosemary. It would be taken to Wayne’s later to be smoked. The sun was set by now. We hoisted the carcass far above the ground, where even the snapping jaws of a coyote wouldn’t be able to get it before Brutus came to the rescue. In the darkness, I carried the pelt to the panty to begin a long night of scraping and salting. Thank you, Steven. A week later, his two daughters were born. This is the circle of life.  
Last update: January 10, 2011
12:30 pm
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