I would like to remind this great gathering of the vision of Oglala Sioux medicine man Black Elk and the vision he had at Harney Peak.

"Then I was standing on the highest mountain of them all, and round about beneath me was the whole hoop of the world. And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being.

And I saw the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and one father, and I saw that it was holy."

"Here at the center of the world where you took me when I was young and taught me: here, old I stand, and the tree is withered, Grandfather, my Grandfather!

Again, perhaps for the last time on this Earth, I recall the great vision you sent me. It may be that some root of the Sacred Tree still lives. Nourish it then, that it may leaf and bloom and fill with singing birds! Hear me, that they may once again go back to the Sacred Hoop, and the Good Red Road, the shielding tree.

In sorrow, I am sending a feeble voice, O six powers of the world. Hear me in my sorrow, for I may never call again. O make my people live."