They say that in the very old days the Sleeping Ute Mountain
was a Great Warrior God who came to fight against
the ones causing much trouble and the Great Warrior
defeated the trouble-ones but was badly hurt and lay down and
fell into a deep sleep and became a sacred mountain with the
uncanny shape of a giant body lying on its back, arms folded
across its chest, each crest and fall in the mountain tracing the
profile of a nose or elbows or knees and this is not one of those
landmarks you have to squint and tilt your head just so to see,
this sleeping Warrior God who lets rain clouds slip from his pockets
when he is happy and who would one day awaken and rise up
to help in the fight against the enemies, or as some kids would whisper
on the playground or at the pool, that the Warrior would awaken and stomp
on the whiteman, and I was a white kid living at the base of the Warrior God
mountain and the shadow of that giant sleeping body would catch my eye
on the way to school, the pointy toes itching to move.

Note: The myth of the Sleeping Ute Mountain is from the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe utemountainutetribe.com.

First appeared in About Place: Geographies of Justice.