The Kogi Mama Speaks

We work to take care of the world.
We respect the Mother Earth... We know that the land is our Mother Earth.
If we plant an orange tree or any type of tree and then dig it up by the roots it will die. Digging out the earth’s gold is the same thing. It could die. We’ve all heard many stories that the world is dying. Why is it dying? It is because they have robbed so many tombs. The world is like a person. Robbing tombs, stealing its gold, it will die. We don’t take out the earth’s gold. We know that it is there but we do not take it. We know from our divinations that the advice of the Mother is not to take the gold. We know where it is but we decide only to make offerings to it.
How is it that we are able to live? Without blood we cannot live and without bones we cannot walk. Here all the Mamas [teachers, custodians of Kogi cosmological thought] are in agreement about what it is we are going to say and how to speak. If i cut off my foot I cannot walk. When they [the Younger Brothers, us] dig into the earth and take it’s gold it is the same thing....Gold has it’s own thought and it can speak. It is a living being. They must stop stealing it.
If they take all the gold the world will end. The Mothers of banana trees, of all the trees and of all the birds, they have all been stolen. They are cutting off the flesh of the Mother’s body. They have taken everything. They have stolen the spirits of all things from the Mother. They are stealing the very spirit and thought of the Mother...
It is the mountains which make the waters, the rivers and the clouds. If the trees are felled they will not produce any more water. We do not cut down the trees that grow by rivers, we know that they protect the water. We do not cut down huge areas of forest like the Younger Brother does, we cut small clearings for our fields. The Mother told us not to cut down many trees, so we cut very few, tiny patches.
If the Younger Brother keeps cutting down all the trees, there will be fires because the sun will heat the earth.... We are the Elder Brothers so we have to think clearly....
Younger Brother, stop doing it. You have already taken so much. We need water to live. The Mother told us how to live properly and how to think well. We’re still here and we haven’t forgotten anything.
The earth is decaying, it is losing its strength because they have taken away much petrol, coal, many minerals. Younger Brother thinks, Yes! Here I am! I know much about the universe! But this knowing is learning to destroy the world, to destroy everything, all humanity.... The Mother is suffering. They have broken her teeth and taken out her eyes and ears. She vomits, she has diarrhoea, she is ill.
If we cut off our arms, we can’t work, if we cut off our legs, we can’t walk. That is how it is with the Mother. The Mother is suffering. She has nothing.
Does the Younger Brother understand what he has done? Does he?