Over on twitter, the Líl̓wat Nation are doing a beautiful job sharing news, events, updates and language.

I deleted my personal twitter account after Elon took the reins and unleashed his particular brand of instability, but you can follow the Lil’wat account through our website, and our Wellness Almanac twitter account @WindsforChange, where we retweet from Lil’wat Nation, SLRD, and a host of other important resources.

Discover the word for bear, or wild animal, grabbed my attention, after I was seduced into a state of bliss reading Paul Vermeesch’s exquisite poem, Notes Towards the Lexicon of a Bear.

Notes Toward a Lexicon of the Language of the Bear

I

In its own language its name means:

I walk slowly on hillsides 
and sleep with a bellyful 
of pleasing berries,
pink flesh, and brains

I dream of love vulgar
and gorgeous beside the rush
of rivers born of glacial ice
and I shun the times of no 
plenty, when all is dark
and white and the blossoms
do not love the red fruit into being.
 
This is the simplest word in its language
and the first one it learns.

II

The bear does not have a word for regret
but the nearest equivalent would be:

I am not proud 
to have gone to the end of the world 
and eaten garbage there
in dumps among the naked and the thin
when I could not last the winter.

This word is often thought but seldom 
spoken among the strong.

III

If you want to say I love you
in the bearish tongue say:

You need not fear me

and translated literally
the word for solitude is:

This side of the mountain is mine.

It made me think: how do I say “i love you?”

The Ucwalmícwts word of the day is “spzu7”! Please see http://Firstvoices.com and listen to the pronunciation and more! https://firstvoices.com/explore/FV/Workspaces/Data/St%CC%95%C3%A1t%CC%95imc/Lil’wat/L%C3%ADl%CC%93wat/learn/words/ea679f06-db9d-432e-911c-3bc5a0e574e5… Kúkwstum̓ckal̓ap | Thank you