Native American Poetry - Essay Example

Native American Poetry “The Cities of White Men” Those men build many houses: The white settlers seem many to the Native Americans, and they seem to need a lot of buildings they dig the earth, and they build; They cut down the trees, and they build; They work always — building. Cutting down trees to clear land and collect building materials seems more important to these people than anything else, and they always seem to be doing it. From the elevation of the mountainside, I behold the clouds: The clouds build many beautiful houses in the sky: They build, and they tear down; They build, and they dissolve. . . . The author here is discussing both true cloud “houses” and comparing them metaphorically to the teepee cities of his people.

The Native American teepee settlements can be put up and torn down in a matter of hours, without marring the landscape, whereas the “white man's cities” are permanent and destructive. The cities of white men are not beautiful like the cloud cities; They are not vast, like the cloud cities. . . . The author does not appreciate the progress of the new cities and prefers the impermanence of the Native American teepee settlements. A wind-swept teepee Is all the house I own. . . . Perhaps the author here wishes that the white men of the cities recognize that they do not need such large buildings and extravagant houses.

“The Blizzard”Whipped onwards by the North Wind The air is filled with the dust of driven snowThe earth is hidden, The sky is hidden, All things are hidden, The air is filled with stinging, Before, behind, above, below, Who can turn his face from it? All the animals drift mourning, mourningOnly the Gray Wolf laughs. This is a poetic description of winter weather, the white-out blizzards that are common on the plains of the Midwest. The stinging snow blows in every direction and there is no escape for any animal except, according to the author, the gray wolf.

Who are ye who wallow in the winds? Who are ye who strike with stinging blows?Man beings out of the North? Beast beings out of the North? Snow beings with fingers of thin ice? The white men of the North are being compared here both to the blizzards and to animals. The buildings and the civilization of the new settlers are as destructive to the land as the winter blizzards. I am a Daughter of the South: My lips are soft, my breath is warm, My heart is beating wildly, I cannot live in the coldAll my animals drift mourning, mourningly the gaunt Gray Wolf is laughing.

The destruction caused by the invasion of civilization destroys both the Native Americans and the animals of the area. Tomorrow three suns will rise, and side by side the earth will be covered with dazzling snow, Cold, cold, and very quiet animals will lie buried in the snow, Cold, and very quiet but the gaunt Gray Wolf will break a new trail, Running, with three shadows blue upon the snow. Moving forward into the future, the growth of civilization will continue to destroy the land and the animals.

However, the author references that the animals are “sleeping”, indicating that they may one day return and that the Gray Wolf will “break a new trail” and return to dominance. Both of these poems take a very negative view of the civilization style of the newcomers. The houses and buildings of the “white man” are seen to have a permanent, destructive, effect on the land around them. However, “The Blizzard” chooses to show this effect by comparing it to another destructive natural phenomenon, winter.

The imagery used in the second poem is violent. In “The Cities of White Men” the author chooses a much softer, sadder tone, contrasting the cities with the calmness of a partly cloudy sky. A similarity again, though, is that both authors choose a natural event as a metaphor, even though they are describing a man-made city.