Third World Short Stories

Courting Flutes

A young man of the tribe deeply loved a young woman, but the woman showed no response to his advances, and acted as if he did not even exist. The man went to seek the advice of a medicine man regarding how to win the love of this young woman. The medicine man told him to find a tree which had been struck by lightning, make a flute from the branch where the lightning had struck, and return to him with the finished flute.
After the man returned, the medicine man smudged and blessed the new flute. The man was instructed to wait until the next moon and then play songs outside the tent of his beloved. Although impatient to win the woman's love, he followed the holy man's instructions and waited until the moon arose.
The gentle breeze, the moonlight and his pure love inspired his playing. Many hours he spent playing newly-composed songs, waiting for the woman's response.
A cloud suddenly covered the moon, which the man took to be an omen; that his ancestors did not intend for him to marry this woman. However, when the cloud passed from the moon and he resumed his playing, the young woman came out of her lodge and, opening the courting blanket, gestured for the man to join her. The songs from the flute had won her love for the man.