Not far from the Ojo Caliente spa is an ancient Pueblo called Posi-ouinge. (Po-see-o-wing-gay).
It is the ancestral home of the Tewa Indians.
Oral histories from the Tewa tell us Posi-ouinge was their home for centuries until an epidemic struck and the elders decided the people should depart.
The Tewa are descendants of prehistoric peoples who lived in the Ojo Caliente drainage during the late 1300s until the 1500s, just before the Spanish entered the area searching for gold.
I spent a couple of hours hiking to this special site and experienced an atavistic knowing, a feeling of life energy embedded in the land.
There is nothing left of the massive adobe homes the people built. Archaeologists speculate the adobes had two and three stories and probably had a thousand rooms to accommodate hundreds of people.
Today there is nothing left but small indentations in the land where Kiva ceremonial holes once existed. The ground is festooned with scattered shards of broken pottery, most no bigger than a potato chip.
I walked slowly to take in the moment. The Stag horn cacti were in yellow bloom and the blue sky streaked with aircraft contrails; a reality contrast to the vibration of the land and its ancient people.
One of their songs says:
Long ago in the north
Lies the road of our emergence!
Yonder our ancestors live
Yonder we take our being.
I leave Friday and head to places in Arizona. I hope you join me.
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