The Navajo Emergence from the Lower Worlds, Early human beings and spiritual ancestors climb up through three dark lower realms before emerging into the present Fourth World.

Lean closer, little one. Do not let your eyes wander to the shadows beyond our small circle of light. The wood is damp, and the fire is dying, much like the breath in my old chest. I need you to listen, not with your ears alone, but with the marrow of your bones. What I tell you is the last unbroken thread of how we came to be. Before the sun was hung in the sky, before the mountains were sculpted from the earth, there was only the damp, heavy womb of the lower worlds. We did not fall from the stars; we climbed out of the black mud of the earth itself.

The Red Womb of Ni’gooláá

In the beginning, there was the First World. It was red, small, and crowded. We did not have these hands to hold, nor these legs to walk. We were mist-beings, insect-people, crawling through the thick, copper-smelling darkness. The mud was cold and clung to our segments like wet clay. There was no light, only the heavy, hot breath of the spirit ancestors—the Water Monster, the Blue Heron, the Frog. We crawled over one another, restless and blind, fighting for room in the cramped dark. But the spirits grew weary of our strife. A great flood of dark water began to rise from the corners of the world, forcing us upward. We found a small opening in the ceiling of that red place, and we squeezed through, leaving the wet, heavy mud behind.

The Climb Through Blue and Yellow

We crawled out into the Second World, which was blue and vast, but empty of comfort. Here, the Blue Swallows lived, and they did not want us. The air smelled of sharp frost and dry stone. It was a cold, unfriendly place, and soon, conflict drove us to climb once more. We sought the hollow stalk of a giant reed, its rough fibers scraping our soft, unformed bodies as we climbed higher, driven by the instinct to survive. We squeezed through into the Third World, which was yellow and beautiful, a place of great rivers and fertile banks. Here, we began to take shapes more like the ones we wear tonight. We planted the first seeds of corn, but we grew proud and forgot to respect the water spirits. The Great Water Monster, angry at our arrogance, sent a wall of black water to drown us. The floods rose, licking at our heels as we ran toward the highest mountain.

The Passage of the Hollow Reed

There was no way out but up. The Holy People planted a giant reed, hollow and strong, and we climbed into its dark throat. Can you feel the rough texture of that wood, little one? Imagine climbing in pitch darkness, the roaring of the floodwaters echoing beneath you, the spray of cold, ancient mist stinging your face. We climbed for days, our fingers bleeding, our muscles burning with a pain we had never known. It was Badger who dug through the sky of the Third World, his claws cracking against the hard crust of the upper earth. Locust followed, drying the wet mud of the passage with his breath. When we finally squeezed through the narrow opening, we collapsed onto the damp, cold shore of the Fourth World.

It was here, on the edge of this white world, that the wind—Ní³ch’i—blew through us for the first time. It was a sudden, sharp shock, like ice entering the lungs. That first breath did not just fill our chests; it gave us our souls. The Holy People laid down two ears of corn, one white and one yellow, wrapped in a sacred buckskin. The wind blew between them, and when the sheet was lifted, the corn had transformed. The white corn became the first man; the yellow corn became the first woman. The spirit of the wind remained inside them, just as it remains inside you and me. Look at the tips of your fingers, child. See the swirls there? That is the trail of the wind that created us, left behind when the first breath dried upon our skin.

The Glittering World and the Fire’s End

This is the Fourth World, the Glittering World. It is a place of hard earth, of hot sun, and of cold winter nights like this one. It is a beautiful world, but it is fragile, bought with the blood, sweat, and endless climbing of those who came before us. They left their shapes in the lower worlds so that we might walk upright in this one. Now, my breath is growing short, and the wind inside me is preparing to leave, to return to the great air that surrounds us.

Keep this memory warm, little one. When the snow falls and the wind howls against the skins of our shelter, remember that the wind is our mother, and the dark earth beneath us is the womb from which we climbed. Do not let the mud of the modern world clog your ears to this truth. Keep the fire burning, and pass the breath of our ancestors to those who will sit where you sit now, long after my bones have turned to dust.