Out of this deep well of frustration springs a yearning for the fresh seeds of springtime. Images of growing, to alter the feelings of stagnation; to renew the growth of spirit being slowly stifled in yet another day in this dungeon built by greed. There is spirit and there is Spirit, just as there is greed and there is Greed. The Spirit, with a capital "S," is what the original Peoples of this land use to fight the Greed, with a capital "G."

THE GREEDS: the takers of the fat know from whence I speak.

On a sunny day in May, in a spot intended to be a warm nesting place for four leggeds, but where instead the Wasichu had pierced the dawn with their dying shriek of vengeance heard in all the ritualistic places where slaughter and laughter go hand in hand (heard by the babies spitted on bayonets during the "Indian Wars"; heard by babies bombed sedately by computer in a jungle hut in Vietnam),* the banshee shriek of the christian god who walls for the enrichment of those deodorized plastic mannikens with the stiff and painted smiles of doom forever emblazoned on the ugly starkness of their greed. In that unlikely place, in a hospital room more like a dungeon, the Deer who Stands was offered the opportunity to become a hired gun in service to a people who were choking out their dying gasp on the scales of geological time, but who imagined in their utter simplicity that they would somehow live forever.

At Marion prison in Illinois, Greed said if I would deliver my brother to the sacrificial altar to be slaughtered, as were our grandfathers and their fathers before them, I would win a prize. If not my freedom, certainly, very nearly so. There was a time when I thought I would do anything to win my freedom. Freedom seemed to be the most precious thing in the world to me. What price to do the dirty work of Greed? The life of a man seemed a meagre price indeed! To me, who had been raised as a Greed (though a full-blood Skin),it seemed the price of Greed was no price at all.

I could hardly believe my good fortune. I must hurry before they change their minds, I thought. What a conceit to imagine one's self a free agent while existing on 24-hour-a-day deadlock solitary confinement in a tiny sealed-tomb tiger-cage. Conceit or delusion. The founders of this hell on earth must know how helpless are their victims to choose: "...like bugs trapped in amber." ** I sadly concluded I would deliver this man, this Leonard Peltier. I could collect my thirty pieces of filthy lucre and be gone. Couldn't I? If not, why not? Stick around and I'll tell you why not.

On a hot 4th of July afternoon, I met Leonard Peltier on the yard at Marion. People were eating hamburgers and hot dogs cooked on the yard over an open fire. Grandfather sun had outdone himself, and it felt good just sitting and talking the afternoon away with him. As we talked, I could see the intensity and emotion beneath the surface of this man when he discussed the problems of his people. I could sense, rather than hear or see, the degree of love and total commitment he felt for the people. I saw the marks of flesh offerings and the piercings of the Sun Dance on his body, and I listened in awed reverence as he quietly told me and the other Skins about sacred matters. As I listened, I realized what a deeply religious man he was, and I thought what an upside-down world we live in when the criminals of this world portray the victims as criminals and make 90% of the sleeping future victims believe in their charade.

Leonard told me about how things were when he was growing up on the Ojibway reservation. Hunger, disease and alcoholism were rampant. Poverty was everybody's lot, and the people were holding weekly meetings in an effort to solve the worst of the conditions. There was little food to eat and there was hunger each and every day for everybody. After the meetings the people would all sit together and share what little food they would have been able to collect.

One day, when Leonard was 14 years old, he saw and heard this Ojibwe woman stand up and speak with tears in her eyes, pleading for someone to help because her children were at home slowly starving to death. She asked if there were no more warriors among our men. She said, if there was why did they not stand up and fight for their starving children. Leonard said that was the day he vowed to help his people for the rest of his life.

As I listened to Leonard I thought of my own life. Full-blood Oneida/Choctaw raised as a whiteman with the whiteman values. Total cultural genocide. All the Indian beaten out of me by the time I was six years old. Spanked for remembering my grandfather and the stories he used to tell me. Forbidden to sing the Indian songs my grandmother taught me. Brown wasichu, me.

Once again I asked myself: "What price to do the dirty work of Greed?" The price would be to end the journey of the fearless warrior, Gwarth-ee-lass, who sat before me. Would all the remaining days of this man called Standing Deer be worth a twinkling flash in the life of this man whose love and dedication to his people - my people - was so intense; so pure; so total?

Although I had not come to the yard with settled intentions of telling him that the u.s. was planning to take his life, I found myself revealing the plot to him in all its sordid detail. I didn't know what reaction to expect because in my heart I was not pure. I reeked with shame. I harbored guilt because I wasn't sure I was going to tell him until the moment I did it. Leonard Peltier shook my hand and looked in my eyes with total love and trust. He smiled as he softly said, "Thank you for telling me." It was then I knew I was coming home to my People.

The few months I spent with Leonard Peltier in Marion prison were the most important days of my life. Leonard re-centered my life. He put me in touch with my roots and started me on the road to recovering the humanity that had been buried most of my life under the conditions of wasichu greed.

Crazy Horse was in a spirit of total resistance until the day lie was murdered in the whiteman's ironhouse after being taken captive. Leonard is in the Spirit of Crazy Horse. When Greed hears his words and gazes upon his warrior image, he can see the Spirit of an unconquered People waiting to be unleashed. And Greed is afraid of unconquered People.

Frederick Douglass said, "Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has, and it never will." Leonard Peltier has become the symbol of native freedom fighters who are making that demand. Leonard represents the Spirit of resistance. The Spirit of a People to say: "NO! ENOUGH! NO MORE! You've taken all you're gonna get!" That's Spirit with a capital "S."

Greed wanted Crazy Horse dead. Greed wanted Sitting Bull dead. Greed wants Leonard Peltier dead. Greed had his way with Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, but he ain't gonna get Leonard.

- Standing Deer -

* Thanks to Marge Piercy: "Each opal secretes the milky grief of babies bombed sedately by computer or spitted on bayonets in the Indian Wars."

** Thanks to Kurt Vonnegut Jr.