Osage Chant: "Planting Chant"

I made a footprint: it is sacred.
I made a footprint: small green specks push through it.
I made a footprint: new green blades push upward.
I made a footprint: above it, blades wave in the breeze.
I made a footprint: over it grow new stalks.
I made a footprint: above it the blossoms lie gray.
I made a footprint: smoke rises from my house.
I made a footprint: there is laughter in my house.
I made a footprint: my family lives in good health.

"Planting Chant," an Osage chant, from Sacred Voices: Essential Women's Wisdom Through the Ages, edited by Mary Ford-Grabowsky. © HarperOne, 2002.

Photography credit: Untitled, by John Kugler (originally color and horizontal).