I have within me such a dream of pain
That all my silver horseman hopes rust still,
Beyond quicksilver mountains,
On the plain,
The buffalo are gone,
None left to kill,
I see the plains grow blackened with that dawn,
No robes for winter warmth
No meat to eat,
The ghost white buffalos' medicine gone,
No hope for Indians then,
I see defeat.
Then there will be changes to another way,
We will fight battles that are legends long.
But of all our glory
None will stay,
Who will remember
that I sang this song?
* (1969). In The Writing on the Wall: 108 American Poems of Protest. Ed. Walter Lowenfels. Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Company: 122. Rpt. from La Farge; executor of estate, Warden M. Kane.
Coyote lives here somewhereThe Coyote, one of the animals who lived on the Great Plains, was a trickster in Indian lore. That means he did a lot of daring things and played many tricks. How might Hershman John's story about Coyote relate to the conflicts of the Great Plains?
Out in the night, his tracks
Lead away from many quarrels
After the beings emerged from the First World
Coyote threw a rock into a deep lake
The beings watched it sink with a splash
and each ripple shook the beings' anger more and more
The people were mad because of Coyote's words:
"If the rock floats, people will live forever"
"If the rock sinks, people will die . . ."
"O bury me not on the lone prairie!"
These words came low and mournfully
From the pallid lips of a youth who lay
On his dying bed at the close of day.
"O bury me not on the lone prairie,
Where the wild coyotes will howl o'er me,
Where the buzzards beat and the wind goes free;
O bury me not on the lone prairie!
"O bury me not on the lone prairie,
In a narrow grave six foot by three,
Where the buffalo paws o'er a prairie sea;
O bury me not on the lone prairie!
"O bury me not on the lone prairie,
Where the wild coyotes will howl o'er me,
Where the rattlesnakes hiss and the crow flies free;
O bury me not on the lone prairie!
"O bury me not," and his voice faltered there,
But we took no heed of his dying prayer;
In a narrow grave just six by three,
We buried him there on the lone prairie.
** (1969). In The Writing on the Wall: 108 American Poems of Protest. Ed. Lowenfels: 162.
(This page last updated 2011; links still need updating; background on this page adapted from efreebackground.com
http://www.efreebackgrounds.com/hu/wallpapers/wallpaper/flowers-trees-and-fruit-backgrounds/4709-prairie-flowers-near-east-glacier-park-montana