Coyote as Eye Juggler

The coyote was going along and he came to some rabbits playing. This was under a very high bluff, this place where those rabbits were. And the rabbits were looking up there and throwing their eyes up. The eyes would go up and then come back into place. Coyote said, “Oh, friends! What a pretty thing you are doing! Let me try it.”

But the rabbits said, “No, you might lose your eyes.” Then Coyote said, “Please let me try.” He just begged. Pretty soon they got tired of him, and they threw his eyes up, and the eyes came back into the sockets again. They did this once and said, “That’s enough for you.”

And he said, “No, let me try it once more.”

And they tried it again. They threw his eyes up again. Then the rabbits began to yell, “Let the eyes get stuck on something up there and not come back.” And his eyes did not come back.

###Coyote Dances with the Reeds

So this coyote was blind, and he went to a swampy place. He came to some reeds at night. Reeds grow in bunches and when the wind blows they sway together. Coyote was walking along and he got in these reeds. The wind was blowing. He yelled and danced in the reeds. He danced with them all night. And in the morning he felt his way out and somehow came to a big camp of coyotes.

###Coyote Gets a Girl but Loses Her because of His Blindness

Coyote came to a camp and he was telling those people stories of what a time he had been having with those Reed girls down at the black water. He said, “Those people surely had a good time last night! Those girls certainly had a lot of fun with me. Why, I never slept a wink last night! I’d better take a nap.” He held his head down so they couldn’t see that he was blind. And when he woke up from his nap he asked for a drink of water. “Give me a drink of water.” And they handed him water.

He said, “I have a habit of drinking nothing but fresh water from the spring.” He wouldn’t drink the water. Then he said, “Only a young girl in buckskin clothes who has never been married can get water for me.”

Right away those people began dressing a girl in buckskin clothes. “Take that water jar down to the spring,” they told her.

Coyote could hear the jingles on her clothes. And that girl went down to the spring, far off. She had been gone only a little while when this blind coyote said, “I’m thirsty. I must drink now. How far is that spring?”

“Oh, straight ahead.”

“I must go down right now.”

When he got to the spring, this girl was still there. One way I’ve heard it is that he said, I’ve just asked your people for you to be my wife. You must go my way.” Another way I’ve heard it is that Coyote heard the jingles on the girl’s clothes and grabbed her. He said, “Drop that jar! Your people just got killed! Take my hand and let’s run!”

So they started to run. Coyote had a bow and arrows. He told that girl, “You know where the cattle go to water.” He was guessing that she would know. She said she would show him. He was holding on to her all the time. There was only one way to go to the water, and they lay there where the cattle would come. He told her to hold the arrow even with the heart of a cow over there and then to tell him when to let it go. Now the cattle were coming to the water.

“There’s one. Get ready,” she said.

Coyote pulled the bow and she pointed the arrow. “What have I done, my wife?”

“You missed it.”

He missed every time. He shot at the last one and killed it And after it was killed they began to butcher it. All the time this girl was wearing the buckskin clothes with pendants on. He heard her all the time. If she ran he could catch her. Coyote told his wife to build a fire close to the animal. He wanted to be near enough to is wife to hear if she should jump or run. He was butchering.

His wife saw that he was cutting a hole in the hide every time he cut. So she said, “Don’t cut a hole in that hide. Be careful. It could be used for something. It’s a nice hide.” That’s what the girl told him. Then the coyote said, “When the knife is sharp you have to go every way with it.” He cut out a piece of meat and said, “Here, put this in the fire. Cook it.”

While the meat was cooking, she was picking up sticks around the fire and was going to put the meat on those sticks. She told him to turn the meat over, and he went over there. He could hear that meat burning. He tried to pick up the meat, but he only picked up coals.

Then his wife looked closely into his face. Since his eyes were gone, the worms were beginning to drop from his eye sockets. He was blind. Then she folded up all her jingles and walked quietly away while he was picking up coals. When she was pretty far away she started to run from that man.

Coyote heard the jingles far away. And he started to run and shouted, “You think I don’t see you? I see where you’re going.” And he took after her through the brush.

The girl pulled off one of her buckskin garments and put it over a little cluster of cactus. If he ran past it and touched it, it would jingle, she knew.

Just as he passed the buckskin dress, it jingled and he jumped on it.

He went right at it and began to have intercourse with the cactus.

He said, “This vagina must be made out of thorns!”

So that girl got away. And Coyote wandered somewhere from there, I don’t know where.