This story is excerpted from Grey Eagle’s audio collection Hear the Wolf: Native American & Sami Stories, produced in 1994, the first year of the Jack Straw Artist Support Program. Ken Jackson, aka Grey Eagle, was born April 27, 1923 and died in 2008. You can read more about him and his legacy at the website of his sons’ family business.

From the liner notes of the Hear the Wolf cassette: “Most Native people believe we are actually related to all other creatures. When the relationship is sensitive, respectful, and balanced, it forms a Sacred Circle. We two-legged have received special gifts from our four-legged relative, Wolf. We’ve been given many lessons by Wolf. These lessons are recounted in stories of American Indians and Sami, the Native People of North Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia. Grey Eagle retells these stories in his own words. It is his way of returning the gifts – the gifts of strong stories and the gifts of lasting lessons. Hearing the stories lets us learn our lessons from Wolf and understand that we can all live together in a Sacred Circle.”