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The Wandering Wizard Wandering The Wizard Wandering Wizard Wizard presents
Three poems from Pauline Johnson's
"Flint and Feather"

"IN THE SHADOWS"

I am sailing to the leeward,
Where the current runs to seaward
Soft and slow;
Where the sleeping river-grasses
Brush my paddle as it passes
To and fro.

On the shore the heat is shaking
All the golden sands awaking
In the cove,
And the quaint sandpiper winging
O'er the shallows, ceases singing
When I move.

On the water's idle pillow
Sleeps the overhanging willow,
Green and cool;
Where the rushes lift their burnished
Oval heads from out the tarnished
Emerald pool.

"AS RED MEN DIE"

Captive!. Is there a hell to him like this?
A taunt more galling than the Huron's hiss?
He, proud and scornful. He, who laughed at law
He, scion of the deadly Iroquois.
He, the bloodthirsty, He, the Mohawk Chief,
He who despises pain and sneers at grief,
Here in the hated Huron's vicious clutch
That even captive, he distains to touch

Captive! but never conquered. Mohawk brave
Stoops not to be to any man a slave.
Least to the puny tribe his soul abhors,
The tribe whose wigwams sprinkle Simcoe's shores.
With scowling brow he stands, and courage high,
Watching with haughty and defiant eye
His captors, as they council o'er his fate
Or strive his boldness to intimidate.
Then fling they unto him the choice:

teepees

"Wilt thou walk o'er the bed of fire that waits thee now ...
Walk with uncovered feet upon the coals
Until you reach the ghostly Land of Souls
And with thy Mohawk death-song please our ear?
Or wilt thou with the women rest thee here?"



FIRE-FLOWERS

And only where the forest fires have sped,
Scorching relentlessly the cool north lands,
A sweet wild flower lifts its purple head,
And like some gentle spirit sorrow-fed,
It hides the scars with almost human hands.

And only in the heart that knows of grief,
Of desolating fire, of human pain,
There comes some purifying sweet belief,
Some fellow-feeling, beautiful - if brief.
And life revives and blossoms once again.




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canoe


Where the very silence slumbers,
Water lilies grow in numbers,
Pure and pale;
All the morning they have rested
Amber crowned and pearly crested,
Fair and frail.

My canoe is growing lazy
In the atmosphere so hazy
While I dream.
Half in slumber I am guiding
Eastward indistinctly gliding
Down the stream.



Death of a Chief
His eyes flash like an eagle's and his hands
Clench at the insult. Like a god he stands.
"Prepare the fire!" he scornfully demands.

The path of coals outstretches, white with heat,
A forest fir's length, ready for his feet.
Unflinching as a rock he steps along
The burning mass, and sings his wild war song.
Up the long trail of fire he boasting goes,
Dancing a war dance to defy his foes.
His flesh is scorched, his muscles burn and shrink,
But still he dances to death's awful brink.

Chief
The eagle plume that crests his haughty head
Will never droop until his heart be dead.
Slower and slower yet his footstep swings,
Wilder and wilder still his death-song rings.
Fiercer and fiercer thro the forest bounds
His voice that leaps to happier hunting grounds.

One savage yell --
Then loyal to his race,
He bends to death, but never to disgrace.




Flint & Feather
Click on the feather, for a collection of poems from
"Flint & Feather" by Pauline Johnson (Tekahionwake)
For more about Pauline Johnson : Archive
Graphics from AltaVista - Corbis Collection

"From Flint & Feather" created July 27, 2000
A Made From Scratch (MFS) Made in CanadaCanadian Product
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