Native American Traditions: Poems of the Navajo Indians of Arizona and northern Mexico
“The Earth is Beautiful”
The Earth is beautiful.
The Earth is beautiful.
The Earth is beautiful.
Below the East, the Earth, its face toward the East.
The top of its head is beautiful.
The soles of its feet are beautiful.
Its feet, they are beautiful.
Its legs, they are beautiful.
Its body, it is beautiful.
Its chest, its breast, its head feather,
They are beautiful.
Below the West, the Sky, it is beautiful, its face toward the West.
The top of its head is beautiful.
The soles of its feet are beautiful.
Its feet, they are beautiful.
Its legs, they are beautiful.
Its body, it is beautiful.
Its chest, its breast, its head feather,
They are beautiful.
Below the East, the Dawn, its face toward the East.
The top of its head is beautiful.
The soles of its feet are beautiful.
Its feet, they are beautiful.
Its legs, they are beautiful.
Its body, it is beautiful.
Its chest, its breast, its head feather,
They are beautiful.
Below the West, the afterglow of sundown, its face toward the West,
Is beautiful.
Below the East, White Corn, its face toward the East,
Is beautiful.
Below the South, Blue Corn, its face toward the South,
Is beautiful.
Below the West, Yellow Corn, its face toward the North,
Is beautiful.
Below the North, Varicolored Corn, its face toward the North,
Is beautiful.
Below the East, Sahanahray1, its face toward the East,
Is beautiful.
Below the West, Bekayhozhon2, its face toward the West,
Is beautiful.
Below the East, Corn Pollen, its face toward the East,
Is beautiful.
Below the West, the Corn Beetle3, its face toward the West,
Is beautiful.
The Earth is beautiful.
The Earth is beautiful.
The Earth is beautiful.
1
God of Earth
God of Sky
3
The devourer of the Navajo’s staple crop.
2
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
1. What are the effects of the repetition?
Consider this if read when read
aloud and if the corn represents fertility.
2. How does anthropomorphism
function in the poem?
3. What key stylistic and ideological
differences are there between this
poem and the Puritans?
These Next Poems are a menagerie of different poetical expressions by the Navajo
1st Set of 4
“Song with which two boys killed their grandmother 1”
Our grandmother says it will be all right that she dies,
Because she has been alive a long time.
That is why she does not mind dying,
Because we cannot keep up with the crowd.
“A white wind from the west”
1. How is the language of these poems
different from the poems of Bradstreet
and Freneau?
2. Who is the author/poet of these poems
and what is the significance of this?
3. What themes about life, death and
nature does this collection present?
4. What figures of speech do you find
in the poems and how does the imagery
function?
From the west a white wind is coming out.
Stand there and look, it is not near,
It is beside the ocean, there you will see it.
By the reflected light of the sun you will see it.
“The Sunrise2”
The sun is rising
At either side a bow is lying,
Beside the bows are lion-babies,
The sky is pink,
That is all.
The moon is setting,
At either side are bamboos for arrow-making,
Beside the bows are wild-cat babies,
They walk uncertainly
That is all.
(A Companion Song)
The sun is slowly departing,
It is slower in its setting,
Black bats will be swooping when the sun is gone,
That is all.
The spirit children are beneath,
They are moving back and forth,
They roll in play among tufts of white eagle down,
That is all.
2nd Set of 4
“Four Songs of Owl Women3”
“Brown Owls”
Brown owls come here in the blue evening
They are hooting about,
1
A song sung by two boys, the singing of which was to cause the death of an old woman who could no longer keep up with the
migrations of the tribe.
2
Songs used to treat sickness caused by the spirits of dead Apaches.
3
Four songs with which Owl Woman, a Papago medicine woman, began her treatment of the sick
They are shaking their wings and hooting.
“In the Blue Night”
How shall I begin my song
In the blue night that is settling?
I will sit here and begin my song.
“The Owl Feather”
The owl feather is rolling in this direction and beginning to sing.
The people listen and come to hear the owl feather
Rolling in this direction and beginning to sing.
“They Come Hooting”
5
Early in the evening they come hooting about,
Some have small voices and some have large voices,
Some have voice of medium strength, hooting about.
3rd Set
“His Heart is Almost Covered with Night4”
Poor old sister, you have cared for this man and you want to see him again, but now his heart is almost
covered with night.
There is just a little left.
“We Will Join Them5”
Yonder are spirits laughing and talking as though drunk.
They do the same things that we do.
Now we will join them.
“The Clouds are Approaching6”
(1)
Clouds are standing in the east, they are approaching,
It rains in the distance,
Now it is raining here and the thunder rolls.
(2)
Green rock mountains are thundering with clouds.
With this thunder the Akim village is shaking.
The water will come down the arroyo and I will float on the water.
Afterwards the corn will ripen in the fields
(3)
Close to the west the great ocean is singing.
The waves are rolling toward me, covered with many clouds.
4
A song given a Papago woman by the spirit of her brother, who told her that man she was going to visit was about to die.
A song taught to Owl Woman by the spirits of a dead Papago man.
6
Four songs sung at a ceremony to bring rain.
5
Even here I catch the sound.
The earth is shaking beneath me and I hear the deep rumbling.
(4)
A cloud on top of Evergreen Trees Mountain singing,
A cloud on top of Evergreen Trees Mountain is standing still,
It is raining and thundering up there,
It is raining here,
Under the mountain the corn tassels are shaking,
Under the mountain the horns of the child corn are glistening
Read the biography and background information about Anne Bradstreet on pages 27-28
Look at the following Bradstreet poems in the textbook. For “The Burning of Our House” answer
questions 1-7. Also, analyze her shift in tone and acquiescence to Puritan ideology (8) , and the usage of
the following allusions (9):
Anne Bradstreet (From the Textbook) “… the Burning of Our House …” Page 29
For “… the Burning of Our House…” note that line 34 is an allusion to Revelations 18:23, line 36 is an
allusion to Ecclesiastes 1:2 , line 40 is an allusion to Isaiah 9:18-20, line 42 is an allusion to Ezra 6:9-12,
line 43 is an allusion 2Corinthians 5:1, and line 54 is an allusion to Luke 12:34. Consult a Bible
(available online) to analyze these allusions. 9 Questions total on this poem.
Anne Bradstreet (From the Textbook) “To My Dear and Loving Husband” Page 126
For this poem analyze the usage of parallelism, the figures of speech in the poem including the allusion
to The Song of Songs 8:7 in line 7, her tone and her thematic dealings with Puritan ideology in the poem
– 4 questions total.
Anne Bradstreet “Before the Birth1 of One of Her Children2”
All things within this fading world hath end,
Adversity doth still our joys attend;
No ties so strong, no friends so dear and sweet,
But with death's parting blow are sure to meet.
The sentence past is most irrevocable,
A common thing, yet oh, inevitable.
How soon, my Dear, death may my steps attend,
How soon't may be thy lot to lose thy friend,
We both are ignorant, yet love bids me
These farewell lines to recommend to thee,
That when the knot's untied that made us one,
I may seem thine, who in effect am none.
And if I see not half my days that’s due3,
What nature would, God grant to yours and you;
The many faults that well you know I have
Let be interred in my oblivious grave;
If any worth or virtue were in me,
Let that live freshly in thy memory
1
5
10
1. What figures of speech are in
the poem and how do they
function?
2. How does parallel structure
create meaning?
3. What is the tone of the poem?
How does diction and punctuation
create this? Be sure to pick out
particular words to discuss.
4. How does Bradstreet address
Puritan ideology in the poem?
15
Bradstreet had 8 children with her husband Simon Bradstreet.
Poem from The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America or Several Poems, Compiled With a Great
Variety of Wit and Learning, Full of Delight By a Gentlewoman of Those Parts, her book of poetry that was
published in London in 1650 without her knowledge or consent by her brother-in-law. A 2nd edition was
published in 1678
3
Thirty-five years. “The days of our years are threescore years and ten.” Psalms 90:10
2
And when thou feel’st no grief, as I no harms,
Yet love thy dead, who long lay in thine arms.
And when thy loss shall be repaid with gains
Look to my little babes, my dear remains.
And if thou love thyself, or loved’st me,
These O protect from step-dame’s4 injury.
And if chance to thine eyes shall bring this verse,
With some sad sighs honour my absent hearse5;
And kiss this paper for thy love’s dear sake,
Who with salt tears this last farewell did take.
20
25
1678
Read the biography about Philip Freneau on Wikipedia because your textbook doesn’t provide one
“The Wild Honey Suckle” by: Philip Freneau (1752-1832)
Air flower, that dost so comely grow,
Hid in this silent, dull retreat,
Untouched thy honied blossoms blow1,
Unseen thy little branches greet:
No roving foot shall crush thee here,
No busy hand provoke a tear.
By Nature’s self in white arrayed,
She bade thee shun the vulgar eye,
And planted here the guardian shade,
And sent soft waters murmuring by;
Thus quietly thy summer goes,
Thy days declining to repose.
Smit with those charms, that must decay,
I grieve to see your future doom;
They died--nor were those flowers more gay,
The flowers that did in Eden bloom;
Unpitying frosts and Autumn’s power
Shall leave no vestige of this flower.
From morning suns and evening dews
At first thy little being came;
If nothing once, you nothing lose,
For when you die you are the same;
The space between is but an hour,
The frail duration of flower.
1786
4
5
1
Stepmother’s
Body, corpse
Bloom.
5
10
15
20
1. How do figures of speech function
and create meaning in the poem?
2. What effect does Deism have on
the poem?
3. Analyze the structure of the poem
and what is actually inexpedient
about it.
4. Analyze the mood and tone of
the poem and pick out words that
create each.
“The Indian Burying Ground” by: Philip Freneau
In spite of all the learned have said,
I still my old opinion keep;
The posture that we give the dead
Points out the soul's eternal sleep.
Not so the ancients of these lands;-The Indian, when from life released,
Again is seated with his friends,
And shares again the joyous feast1.
His imaged birds, and painted bowl,
And venison, for a journey dressed,
Bespeak the nature of the soul,
Activity, that wants no rest.
His bow for action ready bent,
And arrows with a head of stone,
Can only mean that life is spent,
And not the old ideas gone.
Thou, stranger, that shalt come this way,
No fraud upon the dead commit,-Observe the swelling turf, and say,
They do not lie, but here they sit.
5
1. What reverence is there to the
Natives in the poem, but also what
stereotypes?
2. What figures of speech exist in
the poem and how do they function?
3. Analyze the structure of the poem
and what is actually inexpedient
about it.
4. What theme about the Natives does the
poem project, considering the timeframe?
10
15
20
Here still a lofty rock remains,
On which the curious eye may trace
(Now wasted half by wearing rains)
The fancies of a ruder race.
Here still an aged elm aspires,
Beneath whose far projecting shade
(And which the shepherd still admires)
The children of the forest played.
There oft a restless Indian queen
(Pale Shebah2 with her braided hair),
And many a barbarous form is seen
To chide the man that lingers there.
By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews,
In habit for the chase arrayed,
The hunter still the deer pursues,
The hunter and the deer -- a shade3!
And long shall timorous Fancy see
The painted chief, and pointed spear,
And Reason's self shall bow the knee
To shadows and delusions here.
25
30
35
40
1787
1
The North American Indians bury their dead in a sitting posture; decorating the corpse with wampum, the images of birds, quadrupeds,
And (if that of a warrior) with bows, arrows, tomahawks, and other military weapons.” Freneau’s Note
2
The Queen of Sheba, renowned for her beauty. See 1 Kings 10.
3
Ghost, Spirit