Read Ebook: Flint and Feather: Collected Verse by Johnson E Pauline

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Ebook has 643 lines and 29944 words, and 13 pages

After an illness of two years' duration Miss Johnson died in Vancouver on March 7, 1913. The heroic spirit in which she endured long months of suffering is expressed in her poem entitled "And He Said 'Fight On'" which she wrote after she was informed by her physician that her illness would prove fatal.

It is eminently fitting that this daughter of Nature should have been laid to rest in no urban cemetery. According to her own request she was buried in Stanley Park, Vancouver's beautiful heritage of the forest primeval. A simple stone surrounded by rustic palings marks her grave and on this stone is carved the one word "Pauline." There she lies among ferns and wild flowers a short distance from Siwash Rock, the story of which she has recorded in the legends of her race. In time to come a pathway to her grave will be worn by lovers of Canadian poetry who will regard it as one of the most romantic of our literary shrines.

THE WHITE WAMPUM

OJISTOH

I am Ojistoh, I am she, the wife Of him whose name breathes bravery and life And courage to the tribe that calls him chief. I am Ojistoh, his white star, and he Is land, and lake, and sky--and soul to me.

Ah! but they hated him, those Huron braves, Him who had flung their warriors into graves, Him who had crushed them underneath his heel, Whose arm was iron, and whose heart was steel To all--save me, Ojistoh, chosen wife Of my great Mohawk, white star of his life.

Ah! but they hated him, and councilled long With subtle witchcraft how to work him wrong; How to avenge their dead, and strike him where His pride was highest, and his fame most fair. Their hearts grew weak as women at his name: They dared no war-path since my Mohawk came With ashen bow, and flinten arrow-head To pierce their craven bodies; but their dead Must be avenged. Avenged? They dared not walk In day and meet his deadly tomahawk; They dared not face his fearless scalping knife; So--Niyoh!--then they thought of me, his wife.

O! evil, evil face of them they sent With evil Huron speech: "Would I consent To take of wealth? be queen of all their tribe? Have wampum ermine?" Back I flung the bribe Into their teeth, and said, "While I have life Know this--Ojistoh is the Mohawk's wife."

Wah! how we struggled! But their arms were strong. They flung me on their pony's back, with thong Round ankle, wrist, and shoulder. Then upleapt The one I hated most: his eye he swept Over my misery, and sneering said, "Thus, fair Ojistoh, we avenge our dead."

And we two rode, rode as a sea wind-chased, I, bound with buckskin to his hated waist, He, sneering, laughing, jeering, while he lashed The horse to foam, as on and on we dashed. Plunging through creek and river, bush and trail, On, on we galloped like a northern gale. At last, his distant Huron fires aflame We saw, and nearer, nearer still we came.

I, bound behind him in the captive's place, Scarcely could see the outline of his face. I smiled, and laid my cheek against his back: "Loose thou my hands," I said. "This pace let slack. Forget we now that thou and I are foes. I like thee well, and wish to clasp thee close; I like the courage of thine eye and brow; I like thee better than my Mohawk now."

He cut the cords; we ceased our maddened haste I wound my arms about his tawny waist; My hand crept up the buckskin of his belt; His knife hilt in my burning palm I felt; One hand caressed his cheek, the other drew The weapon softly--"I love you, love you," I whispered, "love you as my life." And--buried in his back his scalping knife.

God, in the Mohawk language.

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 disdains to touch!

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

He knoweth not that this same jeering band Will bite the dust--will lick the Mohawk's hand; Will kneel and cower at the Mohawk's feet; Will shrink when Mohawk war drums wildly beat.

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; Sings, as he sang when once he used to roam Throughout the forests of his southern home, Where, down the Genesee, the water roars, Where gentle Mohawk purls between its shores, Songs, that of exploit and of prowess tell; Songs of the Iroquois invincible.

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.

THE PILOT OF THE PLAINS

"False," they said, "thy Pale-face lover, from the land of waking morn; Rise and wed thy Redskin wooer, nobler warrior ne'er was born; Cease thy watching, cease thy dreaming, Show the white thine Indian scorn."

Thus they taunted her, declaring, "He remembers naught of thee: Likely some white maid he wooeth, far beyond the inland sea." But she answered ever kindly, "He will come again to me,"

Till the dusk of Indian summer crept athwart the western skies; But a deeper dusk was burning in her dark and dreaming eyes, As she scanned the rolling prairie, Where the foothills fall, and rise.

Till the autumn came and vanished, till the season of the rains, Till the western world lay fettered in midwinter's crystal chains, Still she listened for his coming, Still she watched the distant plains.

Then a night with nor'land tempest, nor'land snows a-swirling fast, Out upon the pathless prairie came the Pale-face through the blast, Calling, calling, "Yakonwita, I am coming, love, at last."

Hovered night above, about him, dark its wings and cold and dread; Never unto trail or tepee were his straying footsteps led; Till benumbed, he sank, and pillowed On the drifting snows his head,

Saying, "O! my Yakonwita call me, call me, be my guide To the lodge beyond the prairie--for I vowed ere winter died I would come again, beloved; I would claim my Indian bride."

"Yakonwita, Yakonwita!" Oh, the dreariness that strains Through the voice that calling, quivers, till a whisper but remains, "Yakonwita, Yakonwita, I am lost upon the plains."

But the Silent Spirit hushed him, lulled him as he cried anew, "Save me, save me! O! beloved, I am Pale but I am true. Yakonwita, Yakonwita, I am dying, love, for you."

Leagues afar, across the prairie, she had risen from her bed, Roused her kinsmen from their slumber: "He has come to-night," she said. "I can hear him calling, calling; But his voice is as the dead.

"Listen!" and they sate all silent, while the tempest louder grew, And a spirit-voice called faintly, "I am dying, love, for you." Then they wailed, "O! Yakonwita. He was Pale, but he was true."

Wrapped she then her ermine round her, stepped without the tepee door, Saying, "I must follow, follow, though he call for evermore, Yakonwita, Yakonwita;" And they never saw her more.

Late at night, say Indian hunters, when the starlight clouds or wanes, Far away they see a maiden, misty as the autumn rains, Guiding with her lamp of moonlight Hunters lost upon the plains.

THE CATTLE THIEF

They were coming across the prairie, they were galloping hard and fast; For the eyes of those desperate riders had sighted their man at last-- Sighted him off to Eastward, where the Cree encampment lay, Where the cotton woods fringed the river, miles and miles away. Mistake him? Never! Mistake him? the famous Eagle Chief! That terror to all the settlers, that desperate Cattle Thief-- That monstrous, fearless Indian, who lorded it over the plain, Who thieved and raided, and scouted, who rode like a hurricane! But they've tracked him across the prairie; they've followed him hard and fast; For those desperate English settlers have sighted their man at last.

A CRY FROM AN INDIAN WIFE

DAWENDINE

There's a spirit on the river, there's a ghost upon the shore, They are chanting, they are singing through the starlight evermore, As they steal amid the silence, And the shadows of the shore.

You can hear them when the Northern candles light the Northern sky, Those pale, uncertain candle flames, that shiver, dart and die, Those dead men's icy finger tips, Athwart the Northern sky.

You can hear the ringing war-cry of a long-forgotten brave Echo through the midnight forest, echo o'er the midnight wave, And the Northern lanterns tremble At the war-cry of that brave.

And you hear a voice responding, but in soft and tender song; It is Dawendine's spirit singing, singing all night long; And the whisper of the night wind Bears afar her Spirit song.

And the wailing pine trees murmur with their voice attuned to hers, Murmur when they 'rouse from slumber as the night wind through them stirs; And you listen to their legend, And their voices blend with hers.

There was feud and there was bloodshed near the river by the hill; And Dawendine listened, while her very heart stood still: Would her kinsman or her lover Be the victim by the hill?

Who would be the great unconquered? who come boasting how he dealt Death? and show his rival's scalplock fresh and bleeding at his belt. Who would say, "O Dawendine! Look upon the death I dealt?"

And she listens, listens, listens--till a war-cry rends the night, Cry of her victorious lover, monarch he of all the height; And his triumph wakes the horrors, Kills the silence of the night.

Heart of her! it throbs so madly, then lies freezing in her breast, For the icy hand of death has chilled the brother she loved best; And her lover dealt the death-blow; And her heart dies in her breast.

And she hears her mother saying, "Take thy belt of wampum white; Go unto yon evil savage while he glories on the height; Sing and sue for peace between us: At his feet lay wampum white.

"Lest thy kinsmen all may perish, all thy brothers and thy sire Fall before his mighty hatred as the forest falls to fire; Take thy wampum pale and peaceful, Save thy brothers, save thy sire."

And the girl arises softly, softly slips toward the shore; Loves she well the murdered brother, loves his hated foeman more, Loves, and longs to give the wampum; And she meets him on the shore.

"Peace," she sings, "O mighty victor, Peace! I bring thee wampum white. Sheathe thy knife whose blade has tasted my young kinsman's blood to-night Ere it drink to slake its thirsting, I have brought thee wampum white."

Answers he, "O Dawendine! I will let thy kinsmen be, I accept thy belt of wampum; but my hate demands for me That they give their fairest treasure, Ere I let thy kinsmen be.

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