Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light

A Play by Joy Harjo and a Circle of Responses

Joy Harjo, Priscilla Page

• Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
• ISBN:
  9780819578679
• Topic: Médias et arts de la scène
• Subtopic: Dramaturgie théâtre

Joy Harjo's play Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light is the centerpiece of this collection that includes essays and interviews concerning the roots and the reaches of contemporary Native Theater. Harjo blends storytelling, music, movement, and poetic language in Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light—a healing ceremony that chronicles the challenges young protagonist Redbird faces on her path to healing and self-determination. This text is accompanied by interviews with Native theater artists Rolland Meinholtz and Randy Reinholz, as well as an interview with Harjo, conducted by Page. The interviews highlight the lives and contributions of Meinholtz, a theater artist and educator who served as the drama instructor at the Institute of American Indian Arts from 1964–70 and a close mentor and friend to Harjo; and Reinholz, producing artistic director of Native Voices at the Autry, the nation's only Equity theater company dedicated exclusively to the development and production of new plays by Native American, First Nations, and Alaska Native playwrights. The new interview with Harjo focuses on her experiences working in theater.

Essays on Harjo's work are provided by Mary Kathryn Nagle—an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee nation, playwright, and attorney who shares her insights on the legal and historical frameworks through which we can better understand the significance of Harjo's play; and Priscilla Page—writer, performer, and educator (of Wiyot heritage), who looks at indigenous feminism, jazz, and performance as influences on Harjo's theatrical work.

JOY HARJO

Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light || A Ceremony

Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light by Joy Harjo (Mvskoke) || Development and Production History

DECEMBER 2007

Public Theater Native

Theater Festival

New York, New York

Workshop and Staged Reading

JUNE 2008

Native Voices at the

Autry Playwrights Retreat

and Festival of New Plays

San Diego and

Los Angeles, California

Workshop and Staged Reading

MARCH 2009

Native Voices at the Autry

Los Angeles, California

Equity World Premiere

JANUARY 2010

Alaska Native Heritage Center

Anchorage, Alaska

Tour

MARCH 2010

Merrimack College

North Andover, Massachusetts

Tour

MAY 2010

Outpost Performance Space

Albuquerque, New Mexico

Tour

JUNE 2010

Native Voices at the Autry Festival

of New Plays

La Jolla, California

Tour

SEPTEMBER 2010

Oklahoma Center for Poets and

Writers, Tulsa Library Trust,

American Indian Resource Center,

and Readers’ Library

Tulsa, Oklahoma

Tour

DECEMBER 2010

Native Voices at the Autry with the

Public Theater

New York, New York

Workshop

OCTOBER 2011

University of Massachusetts

Amherst, Massachusetts

Reading

February 2012

First Nations House of Learning

University of British Columbia,

Vancouver, BC, Canada

Performance

CHARACTERS

REDBIRD, who may also be the SPIRIT HELPER: a Native woman, Mvskoke, somewhere in her later twenties, thirties, forties, or fifties

GUARDIAN MUSICIAN: a guitar player who accompanies Redbird on her journey

GUARDIAN MUSICIAN comes onstage about five minutes before the curtain speech to set up gear and tune as needed. He sits extreme stage right.

OPENING

GUARDIAN MUSICIAN plays funky music. Music accompanies the story throughout.

The kitchen table, stage left center, is the gut around which all action flows. It is a heart, a bed, a bier, a car, a counter at the bar, an altar, and a hiding place.

Lights up on the table.

REDBIRD enters upstage left, lands down center stage. She wears jeans, red shirt, and cowboy boots.

Light bright sunlight.

REDBIRD: I welcome you on behalf of the family, and thank you so much for coming out to help with our ceremony. Important information: The bathrooms are down the hall, and there’s water and coffee in the kitchen. Don’t forget to turn off your cell phones, iPads, cameras … no taping, or texting.

REDBIRD, as REDBIRD’S relative, picks up rattle and shakes it.

REDBIRD: Please keep in mind that the patient Redbird Monahwee is in a delicate and vulnerable state. There is imbalance between dark and light. We need your good thoughts to help see us through.

And here to assist us in our ceremony is Redbird’s protector guardian.

GUARDIAN MUSICIAN plays a flourish on guitar as a way of introduction. He never speaks in the play.

REDBIRD: I’ve been asked to open with a traditional family story and song, so that our minds come together as one.

Mvto, mvto, thank you: for ancestral and all spiritual help.

REDBIRD shakes a rattle to signal the beginning of the story.

SONG: RABBIT IS UP TO TRICKS

In a world long before this one, there was enough for everyone

until somebody got out of line.

We heard it was Rabbit, fooling around with clay and the wind.

Everybody was tired of his tricks and no one would play with him;

he was lonely in this world.

So Rabbit thought to make a person.

And when he blew into the mouth of that crude figure

to see what would happen, the clay man stood up.

Rabbit showed the clay man how to steal a chicken.

The clay man obeyed.

Then Rabbit showed him how to steal corn.

The clay man obeyed.

Then he showed him how to steal someone else’s wife.

The clay man obeyed.

Rabbit felt important and powerful.

The clay man felt important and powerful.

And once that clay man started he could not stop.

Once he took that chicken he wanted all the chickens.

And once he took that corn he wanted all the corn.

And once he took that wife, he wanted all the wives.

He was insatiable.

Then he had a taste of gold and he wanted all the gold.

Then it was land and anything else he saw.

His wanting only made him want more.

Soon it was countries, and then it was trade.

The wanting infected the earth.

We lost track of the purpose and reason for life.

We began to forget our songs, our stories;

we could no longer see or hear our ancestors,

or talk with each other across the kitchen table.

Forests were being mowed down all over the world to make more.

And Rabbit had no place to play.

Rabbit’s trick had backfired.

Rabbit tried to call the clay man back,

But when the clay man wouldn’t listen

Rabbit realized he’d made a clay man with no ears.

SONG: WINDING THROUGH THE MILKY WAY

CEHOTOSAKVTES

CHENAORAKVTES MOMIS KOMET

AWATCHKEN OHAPEYAKARES HVLWEN

REDBIRD: Two beloved women sang this song on the trail of tears. One walked near the front of the people, one near the back. When either began to falter, they would sing the song to hold each other up.

DO NOT GET TIRED.

DON’T BE DISCOURAGED. BE DETERMINED,

TO ALL COME IN. WE WILL GO TO THE HIGHEST PLACE.

WE WILL GO TOGETHER.

Rattle ends the song.

REDBIRD: Now, our ceremony begins.

SCENE 1

Light bright day.

Light up on kitchen table.

REDBIRD: It was at this kitchen table I was forbidden to sing when I was fourteen. I wasn’t the best singer. It wasn’t about that at all.

The man who had made himself keeper of our house stood there with my stack of albums in his hands.

I had bought and paid for them with money from my dishwas...