The Weeping Cottonwood

Every July, my family drove the dusty backroads of eastern Oregon to the annual Gathering of the Tribes at the Crooked River Reservation. I was seventeen, more interested in the fry bread and the girls than the old dances, but my grandmother insisted I learn the old ways. It was there, under the shade of a massive cottonwood tree, that I first saw the old man.

He wasn’t part of the festivities. He stood apart, near the river, watching me with eyes that seemed to hold the dark water itself. A great horned owl perched on his shoulder, and a gray wolf lay at his feet, its yellow gaze fixed on me. I felt a pull, an inexplicable attraction that both frightened and fascinated me. When he beckoned with a gnarled hand, I found myself walking toward him, leaving the laughter and drumming behind.

He led me along the riverbank to a place where the cottonwoods grew thick and their roots drank from the slow-moving water. A small, weathered tent was pitched there, patched with animal hides and old canvas. Inside, the air smelled of sage and cedar. He motioned for me to sit on a worn blanket, and the wolf and owl settled by his side.

‘I have been watching you, Kylie,’ he said, his voice like the rustle of dry leaves. ‘You carry the old blood, but you do not know it. There is a spirit world that watches over us, and you are ready to see it.’ I was about to ask how he knew my name, but he continued, ‘I am called Elan. I will teach you to walk between the worlds.’

For the next three nights, under the canopy of the cottonwoods, Elan taught me to listen to the wind, to read the tracks of animals not seen by ordinary eyes, and to feel the pulse of the earth beneath my feet. On the fourth night, I asked him, ‘Why me?’ He smiled, and for a moment, his face seemed to flicker like a candle in a draft. ‘Because you are the last of a line that has kept the balance for generations. The spirits are restless, and you must learn to calm them.’

I told my grandmother about Elan, and she grew pale. ‘Elan? He was my grandfather’s grandfather. He died in the great flu of 1918, trying to heal the sick. His spirit was said to walk the river, but no one has seen him in decades.’ I was stunned. The man I had been learning from had been dead for over a century. But when I returned to the tent that night, Elan was there, solid and real, and he laughed when I told him. ‘Death is not the end, Kylie. It is a door. And you, child, are learning to open it.’

As the days passed, I grew stronger in my power. I could sense spirits in the rustling leaves and in the flow of the river. But with each lesson, I noticed a change in the natural world. The cottonwood leaves began to droop, and the river seemed to slow. One night, Elan’s face was lined with worry as he spoke. ‘There is a guardian of this place, a spirit older than the trees. It is tied to the great cottonwood at the center of the grove. You must learn to honor it, or it will wither and die, and with it, the land will become barren.’

He told me that the spirit was angry because a developer had plans to build a dam upstream, which would flood the valley and destroy the grove. ‘You must go to the cottonwood and offer it a piece of yourself, to bind it to the land forever,’ Elan said. ‘But beware, the spirit is not kind. It will test you.’

That night, under a sliver of moon, I walked to the great cottonwood. Its trunk was as wide as my arms could reach, and its bark was scarred with age. I placed my hand on it and felt a trembling beneath my palm. A voice, like the creaking of limbs, filled my mind. ‘You are the one? You are so young, so frail. What can you offer me?’

I pulled a braid of my hair from my pocket and buried it at the base of the tree, along with a small pouch of tobacco. ‘I offer you my memories,’ I said, ‘the happiest ones of this place, so you will know what you are guarding.’ The tree shuddered, and the leaves rustled as if in laughter. ‘You give me memories, but you still hold onto the pain. I need your sorrow as well.’

I felt a cold dread. The spirit was demanding a part of me I was not sure I could give. But I thought of Elan, and of the generations before, and I began to speak of my mother’s death, of the loneliness I had carried since I was ten. As I spoke, the tears came, and I realized I was not just recounting my past, but giving it away. The tree drank in my words, and with each tear, its leaves seemed to brighten.

When I finished, I was emptied, but I felt a warmth spread from the tree into me. The voice was gentler now. ‘You have proven your worth. I will stay. But the darkness you have given me will need a keeper. You must come here every year, on this night, and take back the sorrow I have absorbed, so I do not drown in it.’

I returned to the tent, exhausted, and Elan was waiting. ‘You have done well, Kylie. The grove is safe for now. But remember, the spirit’s bargain is forever. You will carry the pain of this land as long as you live.’

I left the reservation with a heavy heart, but also with a sense of purpose. Each year, I return to the weeping cottonwood, as Elan taught me, and I take back the sorrow it holds for me. And sometimes, when the wind blows through the leaves, I hear Elan’s whisper, reminding me that the spirits are always watching, and that the balance must be kept. The cottonwood still stands, its branches bowing like a grieving mother, and I know that as long as I come, it will never fall.