Then
I was standing on the highest mountain of them all, and round about beneath
me was the whole hoop of the world. And while I stood there I saw more than
I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred
manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes
as they must live together like one being.
And I say the sacred hoop of my people was one of the many hoops that made
one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one
mighty flowering tree to shelter all the children of one mother and one
father. And I saw that it was holy...
But anywhere is the center of the world.
Black Elk
Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux