HOW THE SUN GOT INTO THE SKY

Once the earth was covered in total darkness and all the animals lived on an island with a chief, his wife, and their only son. While the son was growing up, he fell ill and died. The chief summoned the animals to his house where they placed the dead boy on the bed and mourned. They wept over his corpse every day, until one morning the chief’s wife discovered the body was alive again, full of incredible light and brightness.

“How is this so?” the mother asked.

“The Great Spirits were tired of listening to your tears, day after day, and they sent me back to make you stop wailing,” he said.

His parents were overjoyed, pampering him more than before and making sure he had all the fish and fruit he wanted to eat. He ate and ate until the food supply became low. The chief decided he must send his son away before they ran out of food.

“Son,” the chief said, “I have here a blanket full of strawberries and fish, and Giant Raven will carry you through the sky to a new home.”

“I will do as you wish,” the son replied.

The chief said, “I want you to drop the strawberries and fish back to earth as Giant Raven flies you to your new home. That way, you will always find enough food on this earth to eat.”

“Very well, father,” the son said.

As Giant Raven carried the son to his new home on the banks of a distant river, the son scattered fish and berries across the earth. In doing this, the son filled the sky with brightness, and the brightness multiplied the fruit and fish so that there was plenty for all.

From Traditional Stories and Foods: An American Indian Remembers, by Joan Leslie Woodruff