When the Light of the World Was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through (Part 1)

Source of book: I own this. 

 

First, an introduction to this collection. When the Light of the World Was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through is a Norton anthology of Native Nations poetry, edited by Joy Harjo. This was one of my purchases with my “mad money,” aka credit card rewards. Although I have lucked out and found a lot of good poetry used at library sales, there are some that have been stubbornly difficult to find at a reasonable price. This book was one of those, so I just went ahead and ordered a new paperback edition. 

The book is divided into five sections, each representing a geographical area of the United States. Within each section, the poems selected are arranged in the chronological order of the poet’s birth. In some cases, these works date to the Colonial era. Most are written in English, but some are in both English and an Indigenous language, either with a translator (in the case of the older ones) or by the author (the usual case with modern poems.) 

 

As is my practice, I am reading one section at a time, rather than trying to experience over 400 pages all at once. I will return to this book from time to time, and blog about each section in turn. The first section is “Northeast and Midwest,” which is pretty self explanatory. I won’t attempt to list all the tribes represented here, but will make a note of the affiliation of the poets I quote. Of necessity (and copyright law), I will not be quoting the entire section, so there will be omissions. I do strongly encourage my poetry-loving readers to buy this book - it is full of goodness and an important part of the American poetic tradition. 

 

***

 

Next up, I thought I might give a little of my own background. I have no known Native American ancestors (although, since one branch of the family has an unknown father, it is possible, I suppose). I make no claim whatsoever to being Native American. That said, I have ongoing connections with a few tribes, and my experiences have given me an appreciation for the rich traditions and culture of our indigenous peoples. 

 

First, during my teens and early twenties, I was involved with a number of volunteer trips to the Navajo reservation. For the most part, these trips were focused on empowering local pastors in their work, through construction of buildings, and distribution of food and clothing. For the most part, our role was not to be the “white saviors” but to give the Navajo pastors the support and resources that they could use to assist their communities. As a result of this, I got to meet and talk with one of the Navajo Code Talkers (since passed on) as well as a number of leaders, musicians, preachers, teens, and kids. I ate fry bread and mutton stew, played tag in the scrub, lived through a crazy thunderstorm, and jammed along with Brush Arbor (not the more famous one, but a group of middle aged guys having fun and making good music.) While I struggle with the colonialist underpinnings of missionary work, I do not regret this part of my youth. I learned a lot, and I still appreciate the “we are here to support you, not tell you what to do” ethos of the work we did. 

 

More recently, I have represented a few Indian Tribes (using the legal term there) in Juvenile Dependency proceedings under the Indian Child Welfare Act for the last 19 years. Working with the Tribes to keep Indian Families (the legal term, again) together. It has been really eye-opening to see how our systems are ill equipped to deal constructively with poverty and addiction, particularly when families are non-white. Working with Native Americans who are doing great work as social workers, addiction counselors, lawyers, judges, and more has been an honor. 

 

Finally, over the last ten years, I have taken the kids to various cultural sites as part of our exploration of national and state parks. I want them to understand the incredible civilization that existed here before colonialists destroyed it, and appreciate the universal human values that tie us to all humanity. 

 

***

 

As one might expect from any poetry collection, the poems cover a range of topics. That said, there are two themes that ran through this section. One is the history of genocide, violence, and continued oppression against Native Americans. This is no surprise, of course. Poetry has always been political, and the “lament” as an art form dates back to the dawn of human history. In my own religious tradition, a shocking number of the Psalms are songs of lament, expressing sorrow, pain, and outrage at the injustice of exile, oppression, and genocide. 

 

The second theme is the connection of indigenous peoples to their land, to their history and heritage, and their resilience in the face of hardship. These poems are often sublime and resonate far beyond any one culture. 

 

The first poem I want to quote is still the one I love the best. It isn’t in any one section, but is the invocation that opens the book. It is now one of my all-time favorite poems. 

 

Prayer for Words

By M. Scott Momaday (Kiowa) 

 

My voice restore for me. — NAVAJO

 

Here is the wind bending the reeds westward,

The patchwork of morning on gray moraine;

 

Had I words I could tell of origin,

Of God’s hands bloody with birth at first light,

Of my thin squeals in the heart of his breath,

Of the taste of being, the bitterness,

And scents of camasroot and chokecherries.

 

And, God, if my mute heart expresses me,

I am the rolling thunder and the bursts

Of torrents upon rock, the whispering

Of old leaves, the silence of deep canyons.

I am the rattle of mortality.

 

I could tell of the splintered sun. I could

Articulate the night sky, had I words.

 

That’s just such a great poem, from the opening image of wind, reeds, morning, and glacial remnants; through the picture of God birthing us, the “taste of being,” the link to plants rooted in earth; to the splintered sun and unspeakable night sky. I feel I have lived this poem in my own way, standing on the bones of the earth in the mountains, watching the parade of the stars, and yearning for a connection to the divine. 

 

Each section is introduced with an essay, but Joy Harjo starts the whole book off (after the invocation) with a tour-de-force. I’ll just quote a bit, but the whole thing was fantastic. 

 

We begin with the land. We emerge from the earth of our mother, and our bodies will be returned to earth. We are the land. We cannot own it, no matter any proclamations by paper state. We are literally the land, a planet. Our spirits inhabit this place. We are not the only ones. We are creators of this place with each other. We mark our existence with our creations. It is poetry that holds the songs of becoming, of change, of dreaming, and it is poetry we turn to when we travel those places of transformation, like birth, coming of age, marriage, accomplishments, and death. We sing our children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren: our human experience in time, into and through existence. 

 

I wish I could quote more, as Harjo goes on to point out that Native Americans are still an afterthought in their own land, because their very existence “means that the mythic storyline of the founding of this country is inaccurate.” Native Americans were wrongly considered to be “savages” because, among other things, theirs was an oral more than a written poetic tradition. As if that were a meaningful moral distinction. 

 

The last page of the essay makes a crucial and often forgotten point: Until the American Indian Religious Freedom Act was passed in 1978 - during my lifetime! - Native American religious, ceremonial, and cultural rites were largely illegal. That is shameful in any country, but particularly in one supposedly devoted to religious freedom. 

 

Moving along to the main body of poems, I thought I would start with a song so old that it has no known author. The song was sung by Gegwejiwebinan, an Ojibwe singer, and recorded by ethnologist Frances Densmore sometime between 1907 and 1909. Densmore then had local interpreters translate the song. In the book, the original in both Ojibwe and English from Densmore’s book is printed followed by a contemporary transliteration of the Ojibwe and a more modern literal translation of the lyric. The differences are fascinating. In the case of the Ojibwe, the breaks between words are different, and the phonetical sounds are interpreted slightly differently. The English too is somewhat different. As always, translation isn’t a science - it is truly an art, and multiple translations can be “true” even though they differ. Here are the English ones:

 

The Water Birds Will Alight

 

[Densmore version - translated by Mary Warren English]

 

Surely

Upon the whole length of my form

The water birds will alight

 

[Literal translation by Margaret Noodin]

 

It is certain they land on me the thunderbirds across my existence

 

Two very different takes on a song. 

 

Margaret Noodin also translates a poem by Jane Johnston Schoolcraft (Bamewawage Zhikaquay, Ojibwe) from the early 1800s. Schoolcraft wrote both English and Ojibwe versions of her poems, with the English ones taking on the typical form of 19th Century English poetry, and are very different from the Ojibwe versions. (This is similar to what Rabindranath Tagore did with Gitanjali) This book prints the Ojibwe version, followed by Noodin’s literalist translation, followed by Schoolcraft’s English versions. 

 

To the Pine Tree

 

[Ojibwe version and Noodin translation]

 

Zhingwaak! Zhingwaak! Ingii-ikid, – Pine! Pine! I said,

Weshki waabamag zhingwaak – The one I see, the pine

Dagoshinaan neyab, endanakiiyaan. – I return back, to my homeland.

Zhingwaak, zhingwaak nos sa! – The pine, the pine my father!

 

Azhigwa gidatisaanan – Already you are colored

Gaagige wezhaawashkozid. – Forever you are green

Mii sa naa azhigwa dagoshinaang – So we already have arrived

Bizindamig ikeyaamban – Listen in that direction

Geget sa, niminwendam – Certainly I am happy

Miinwaa, waabandamaan – And I see

Gii-ayaad awiiya waabandamaan niin – He was there I saw it myself

Zhingwaak, zhingwaak nos sa! – The pine, the pine my father!

Azhigwa gidatisaanan. – Already you are colored.

 

Gaawiin gego, gaa-waabanda’iyan – Nothing, you did show me

Dibishkoo, ezhi-naagwasiinoon – Like that, the way it looks

Zhingwaak wezhaawashkozid – Pine he is green.

Wiin eta gwanaajiwi wi – He is beautiful

Gaagige wezhaawashkozid. – Forever he is the green one.

 

[English version by Schoolcraft]

 

The pine! the pine! I eager cried,

The pine, my father! see it stand,

As first that cherished tree I spied,

Returning to my native land.

The pine! the pine! oh lovely scene!

The pine, that is forever green.

 

Ah beauteous tree! ah happy sight!

That greets me on my native strand

And hails me, with a friend’s delight,

To my own dear bright mother land

Oh ‘tis to me a heart-sweet scene,

The pine—the pine! that’s ever green.

 

Not all the trees of England bright,

Not Erin’s lawns of green and light

Are half so sweet to memory’s eye,

As this dear type of northern sky

Oh ‘tis to me a heart-sweet scene,

The pine—the pine! that ever green.

 

Again, the feel is very different. Whether to prefer Schoolcraft’s own translation or a more literal one is a matter of taste, perhaps. One wonders what Schoolcraft might have done in a later era, when English verse wasn’t as constrained by form. 

 

Another poem on nature that I really loved is by Emily Pauline Johnson (Mohawk) who was both a poet and a popular performer who gave shows in which she addressed the stereotypes of Native and European women, back in the late 1800s and early 1990s. 

 

Marshlands

 

A thin wet sky, that yellows at the rim,

And meets with sun-lost lip the marsh’s brim.

 

The pools low lying, dank with moss and mould,

Glint through their mildews like large cups of gold.

 

Among the wild rice in the still lagoon,

In monotone the lizard shrills his tune.

 

The wild goose, homing, seeks a sheltering,

Where rushes grow, and oozing lichens cling.

 

Late cranes with heavy wing, and lazy flight,

Sail up the silence with the nearing night.

 

And like a spirit, swathed in some soft veil,

Steals twilight and its shadows o’er the swale.

 

Hushed lie the sedges, and the vapours creep,

Thick, grey and humid, while the marshes sleep.

 

Next, I want to mention a couple poems that I really loved, but are too long to quote. And also, one is formatted in a way that is difficult to duplicate on Blogger’s platform. Peter Blue Cloud (Mohawk) was quite the artist, working in poetry, painting, sculpture, and carpentry. And that was just what he did on weekends, working as a steelworker, logger, ironworker, ranch hand, and archaeological field worker. That’s quite a life. “The Old Man’s Lazy” is a truly great takedown of the “lazy Indian” stereotype. (It also works well for the “lazy Negro” trope too…) In particular, the “why don’t you fix your fence” thing is awesome. After all, it was the white guy obsessed with finding gold that put up the damn fence…I can’t find a link to this poem, but it’s a good one.

 

The other poem is “Rattle,” and has two parallel poems in opposing columns, as if they were to be sung together. Again, I really wish I could find a version to link. I could definitely see getting some of Blue Cloud’s poetry by itself, as I enjoyed both selections here. 

 

Another modern poem that I liked is by Jim Northrup (Anishinaabe). I was familiar with his name from his plays, although I don’t think I have read one. They most have been mentioned in a literature book from high school or something. 

 

Shrinking Away

 

Survived the war but

was having trouble

surviving the peace

Couldn’t sleep more than two hours

was scared to be without a gun

nightmares, daymares

guilt and remorse

wanted to stay drunk all the time

1966 and the VA said

Vietnam wasn’t a war

They couldn’t help

but did give me a copy

of the yellow pages

picked a shrink off the list

50 bucks an hour

I was making 125 a week

We spent six sessions

establishing rapport

Heard about his military life

his homosexuality

his fights with his mother

and anything else he

wanted to talk about

At this rate, we would have

got to me in 1999

Gave up on that shrink

couldn’t afford him

wasn’t doing me any good

Six weeks later my shrink

killed himself—great

Not only guilt about the war

but new guilt about my dead shrink

If only I had a better job

I could have kept on seeing him

I thought we were making real progress

maybe in another six sessions

I could have helped him

That’s when I realized that

surviving the peace was up to me

 

That’s one wicked bit of satire. 

 

One thing I like about this collection is that it has a good balance of male and female poets - it definitely isn’t the androcentric European norm, to say the least. In the case of the next poet, Chrystos (Menominee), she is a “two-spirit,” which I think is a term that is useful in understanding gender and sexual minorities. This poem of hers is perceptive and disquieting. 

 

The Real Indian Leans Against

 

the pink neon lit window full of plaster of paris

& resin Indians in beadwork for days with fur trim

turkey feathers dyed to look like eagles

abalone & bones

The fake Indians, if mechanically activated

would look better at the Pow Wow than the real one in plain jeans

For Sale       For Sale

with no price tag

One holds a bunch of Cuban rolled cigars

one has a solid red bonnet & bulging eyes ready for war

Another has a headdress from hell

with painted feathers on bird on earth 

would be caught dead in

All around them are plastic inflatable

hot pink palm trees     grinning skulls

shepherd beer steins     chuckling checkbooks

black rhinestone cats

& a blond blow up fuck me doll for horny men

who want a hole that will never talk back

There are certainly more fake Indians

than real ones but this is the u.s.a.

What else can you expect from the land of sell

your grandma      sell our land      sell your ass

You too could have a fake Indian in your parlor

who never talks back

Fly in the face of it

I want a plastic white man

I can blow up again & again

I want turkeys to keep their feathers

& the non-feathered variety to shut up

I want to bury these Indians dressed like cartoons

of our long dead

I want to live

somewhere 

where nobody is sold

 

Another one I had hoped to link, but decided it was too long is “Sweetgrass is Around Her” by Salli M. Kawennotakie Benedict (Awkwesasne Mohawk), a loving tribute to the poet’s great aunt, who wove baskets. I did find a screen shot from another publication, if you want to read it. 

 

I decided I did want to quote this entire poem, even if it is a bit long. Kimberly Laeser (Anishinaabe) served as the Wisconsin Poet Laureate a few years back, and has a rather impressive resume as a writer and teacher. This poem may have my favorite line in the book - it’s brilliant. 

 

Apprenticed to Justice

 

The weight of ashes

from burned-out camps.

Lodges smoulder in fire,

animal hides wither

their mythic images shrinking

pulling in on themselves,

all incinerated

fragments

of breath bone and basket 

rest heavy

sink deep

like wintering frogs.

And no dustbowl wind

can lift

this history

of loss.

 

Now fertilized by generations—

ashes upon ashes,

this old earth erupts.

Medicine voices rise like mists

white buffalo memories

teeth marks on birch bark 

forgotten forms

tremble into wholeness.

 

And the grey weathered stumps,

trees and treaties

cut down

trampled for wealth.

Flat Potlatch plateaus

of ghost forests

raked by bears

soften rot inward

until tiny arrows of green

sprout

rise erect

rootfed

from each crumbling center.

 

Some will never laugh

as easily.

Will hide knives

silver as fish in their boots,

hoard names

as if they could be stolen

as easily as land,

will paper their walls

with maps and broken promises,

scar their flesh

with this badge

heavy as ashes.

 

And this is a poem

for those

apprenticed

from birth.

In the womb

of your mother nation

heartbeats

sound like drums

drums like thunder

thunder like twelve thousand

walking

then ten thousand

then eight

walking away

from stolen homes

from burned out camps

from relatives fallen

as they walked

then crawled

then fell.

 

This is the woodpecker sound

of an old retreat.

It becomes an echo.

an accounting

to be reconciled.

This is the sound

of trees falling in the woods

when they are heard,

of red nations falling

when they are remembered.

This is the sound

we hear

when fist meets flesh

when bullets pop against chests

when memories rattle hollow in stomachs.   

 

And we turn this sound

over and over again

until it becomes

fertile ground

from which we will build

new nations

upon the ashes of our ancestors.

Until it becomes

the rattle of a new revolution

these fingers

drumming on keys.

 

In particular, “And the grey weathered stumps / trees and treaties / cut down / trampled for wealth” is amazing. The exploitation of human beings and the natural world to enrich a few nasty old men is unfortunately the story of the Western Hemisphere. 

 

There is one more nature poem that I wanted to quote. This one is by James Thomas Stevens (Akwesasne Mohawk). 

 

Tonawanda Swamps

 

As it would for a prow, the basin parts with your foot.

Never a marsh, of heron blue

                                                  but the single red feather

from the wing of some black bird, somewhere

a planked path winds above water,

the line of sky above this aching space.

 

Movement against the surface

is the page that accepts no ink.

A line running even

over the alternating depths, organisms, algae,

a rotting leaf.

 

Walk naked before me

carrying a sheaf of sticks.

It's the most honest thing a man can do.

 

As water would to accept you,

I part

a mouth, a marsh, or margin

is of containment,

the inside circuitous edge.

 

No line to follow out to ocean,

no river against an envelope

of trembling white ships.

Here I am landlock.

Give me your hand. 

 

I’ll end this post with one by Kimberly Wensaut. I liked the poem, of course, but I also wanted to highlight Wensaut because she is Potawatomi, one of the tribes that I have worked for. It is always nice when personal and professional combine in a good way (often it is the reverse, alas...that’s the life of a professional). I like this poem because of its great storytelling, its precise and imaginative use of the language, and for the perceptive linking of related words: “Prodigal, prodigious, prodigy.”

 

Prodigal Daughter

 

Once, when I came home

after sixty days on the road,

my mother said, Oh -

the prodigal daughter has returned.

 

Prodigal, prodigious, prodigy.

 

In my blood is a way of life.

Migration and distance bridge the gap

in our seasonal souls.

Winter camp, summer camp

kept those villages on the move.

 

Or maybe it is because 

no one remembered 

to save my cord at birth.

That sturdy life line

which delivered me whole

into this world, anchored me

to the generations. 

 

They used to do this. Kept it

in a finely beaded pouch

as one would keep a thing 

of immense worth. If this was not done,

they said the child would be foolish

or would always be searching.

 

Maybe it is the thunders

who breathed life into my body.

They are forever wanting

to lift me high and carry me away.

 

Once, I thought I could settle

into the arms of pine, hemlock,

spruce and icy river.

But this has not happened yet.

 

Home is elusive.

It shapeshifts with the currents

of my heart and its will.

Home is a trickster changing 

according to the medicine

of the season and its lesson.

 

I was weary, this last ride home.

Every fiber ready to surrender.

Sage and a small courage 

begged my continuance.

 

There is frost on my doorway,

and leaves unswept.

There are miles to dream 

before I meet the morning again. 

 

I see a lot of my own self in that poem. While I am in some ways anchored to my home, my family, my life; I am restless with curiosity. I have been unable to “settle,” so to speak. U2’s song “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” is the theme song of my journey. “Home” in the metaphorical sense has been elusive to me for over a decade. I am not remotely welcome in the religious tradition I was raised in, because I refuse to bow to the political and cultural hate that dominates it now. I haven’t been truly accepted by my parents for a long time, unfortunately. (And for reasons related to that religion.) Finding my “tribe” so to speak has been an ongoing process. I miss the feeling of being “anchored” that I once had. But such is the price of intellectual, spiritual, and moral integrity sometimes. That last stanza intrigues me, because it seems to be a deliberate inversion of the last lines of Frost’s “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Frost is entrapped by his promises, and thus has miles to go before he sleeps. Wensaut has the calling to wander, and thus has “miles to dream” before the morning calls her away again. 

 

I am glad that I purchased this collection. It fills a missing place in my poetry collection, and was a joy to read. I am looking forward to experiencing the poetry of the other geographical areas in time. As an American, I believe that being honest about our past - and our present - is crucial for healing and truly addressing the challenges we face. As they have been throughout history, our artists, particularly our poets, are our prophets. And, as always, it isn’t the prophets who speak comfort to the privileged who are telling the truth. This collection represents a small slice of the greater body of Indigenous Peoples poetry - a voice that desperately needs to be heard by all of us.