Maya Turtle, Antonio Médiz Bolio (1884-1945), translated by Gregory McNamee in A World of Turtles
When something bad is going to happen, the turtle slips into the shallow water underneath our wells and stays there for several days, until what is going to happen has happened.
Maya Turtle, Antonio Médiz Bolio (1884-1945), translated by Gregory McNamee in A World of Turtles This was a curious coincidence! a very amusing occurrence! to see such a similarity of feelings between the two phereoikoi [house-carriers] for so the Greeks call both the shell-snail and the tortoise.
Reflections on a Tortoise, Gilbert White, (1789) in A World of Turtles, edited by Gregory McNamee and Luis Alberto Urrea As the child grows, the house has to grow, too, from the mountains to sea, in order to contain him. For he is a stretching kupua,* and nothing can hold him.
* a stretching kupua, a shape-shifting divinity who manifests in various landforms Kana Rescues Hina, Hawai'ian myth, A World of Turtles, edited by Gregory McNamee and Luis Alberto Urrea In the beginning there was no light, and everywhere there was water.
The Creation, Maidu folktale, in A World of Turtles, edited by Gregory McNamee and Luis Alberto Urrea As she fell, she grabbed hold of a tree and pulled loose a handful of seeds.
Turtle Island, Abenaki myth, in A World of Turtles: A Literary Celebration, edited by Gregory McNamee and Luis Alberto Urrea |
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