Luis Chavez singing the Native American Corn Song. (Photos by Phyllis McCabe)
The City of Kingston, the Association of Native Americans of the Hudson Valley and members of the Munsee, Esopus and Ramapough Lenape nations hosted the first Winter Solstice and Wiping Away the Tears ceremony on Wednesday, December 21, outside City Hall on Broadway.
The event opened with a filling of four sacred pipes representing all races, followed by a calling in the Four Directions ceremony. A Munsee prayer was offered led by Grandfather Paul Coyote Song Tobin. Next Mayor Steve Noble offered an apology from the city for past injustices and called for longer, stronger relationships and for bringing more Native American culture to Kingston. A “Wiping of the Tears” ceremony was then held, where those in attendance stood next to each other and wiped away each other’s tears.
This traditional Native American ceremony clears past hurts, connects us to the land and makes way for us to enter a new, positive relationship with one another.
A closing ceremony of an offering of tobacco to the fire marking the release of what people don’t want to carry into the long night and the winter.An exchange of gifts between Grandfather Paul Coyote Song Tobin and Kitt Potter, Kingston’s Director of Arts and Cultural Affairs.The Wiping of the Tears ceremony to “brush the salt from their cheeks, the blockage from their ears so we can hear each other, remove the grief from our throats so we can speak to each other, take the ice away from our hearts so we can love each other, so we can see each other’s families and be back again in relationship.”The Red Cloud drum circle.Grandfather Paul Coyote Song Tobin.Corinne Wolcott of Rosendale gets smudged or cleansed before the event begun.Josh Alexander, a member of the Red Cloud Breakers drum circle.Winter mask.The Sacred Pipes offering, representing the four races of the people and the earth.
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