By Bertrand N. O. Walker
Hush thee and sleep, little one,
The feathers on thy board sway to and fro;
The shadows reach far downward in the water
The great old owl is waking, day will go.
Rest thee and fear not, little one,
Flitting fireflies come to light you on your way
To the fair land of dreams, while in the grasses
The happy cricket chirps his merry lay.
Tsa-du-meh watches always o’er her little one,
The great owl cannot harm you, slumber on
’Till the pale light comes shooting from the eastward,
And the twitter of the birds says night has gone.
Poet Bio
Bertrand Nicholas Oliver Walker, who published poems under his Wyandot name Hen-toh, was born in 1870. A member of the Oklahoma band of the Big Turtle Clan, he attended the Seneca Indian School and public school in Seneca, Missouri. He worked as an educator for many years and was the chief clerk for the Quapaw Agency in Miami, Oklahoma at the time of his death in 1927.
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