"You don't have anything / if you don't have the stories. / Their evil is mighty / but it can't stand up to our stories. / So they try to destroy the stories / let the stories be confused or forgotten." (Silko 2)
This citation is about the stories of Native Americans and their culture. The natives don't have writing, so their oral traditions are very strong. They use these traditions to convey not only stories to learn from, but also their history; their very language is embedded with their stories. Without history and culture, we are essentially nothing but an empty shell, doomed to repeat ourselves.
The poem goes on to say that a certain society (most likely Americans), no matter how powerful they supposedly are, are nowhere near the level culturally and spiritually of the natives. Because of this, that society will try to take away what makes Native Americans strong, and force them to convert their way of life and act "civilized". By doing this, natives lose their identity and will have no choice but to follow society. They destroy their language, which holds their stories, and teach newer generations their lifestyles, causing the Native American traditions to die out.
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