ONCE COYOTE WAS COMING along through the bulrushes on the edge of a lake and he stopped to take a look around. There were all kinds of water birds there, including mallard ducks and those big white swans. They were camping there and they were swimming all around. There were a lot of good-looking fat geese.
Coyote came out of the bulrushes and began walking along where everyone would see him. He had a big bag of some sort on his back.
“Hey, Coyote,” they called. “What are you carrying in there? It looks heavy.”
“Oh, these are my songs.”
“Why do you have so many songs?”
“I have many visions. I get all these songs that way. Besides, I like to dance, so I like to have a lot of songs with me.”
“Well, let’s have a big dance then. You can sing some of these songs.”
“Well, okay. But these are powerful songs. You can’t fool around. You have to do what I say. You can’t act crazy.”
They said they would be good and they made up a big place for dancing.
Coyote began to tell them what to do. He took out his dancing sticks.
“No one may look at anything while I am singing my songs. You must dance with your eyes shut. If you open your eyes you’ll get hurt bad, maybe even killed.”
They agreed to keep their eyes shut and they began to dance. Coyote was a good singer and they danced hard. Coyote was beating on a log with his dancing sticks.
“Remember, brothers, keep your eyes closed. When we are finished maybe I will see about giving you some of these songs.”
While they were all dancing around, Coyote reached into his bag and pulled out a big club. When one fat duck came by he hit it over the head and killed it.
“Stop brothers!” yelled Coyote. “Look at this! Look at what has happened to this person. He opened his eyes and now he is dead. Keep your eyes closed.”
They all began dancing again and even singing some of their own songs, dancing as hard as they could. Coyote grabbed one of the ducks by the throat and it made a bad squawking noise. “That’s right brothers, sing as loud as you can.”
He’d hit almost all the ducks with his club when a black duck who had been listening to all these noises opened up one eye, only a little. He saw what Coyote was doing and called out to the others, “Run away! This is Coyote hitting everyone with a stick.” The birds that were left ran for the water but only a few got away.