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It’s autumn in the country I remember

How warm a wind blew here about the ways!
And shadows on the hillside lay to slumber
During the long sun-sweetened summer-days.

It’s cold abroad the country I remember.

The swallows veering skimmed the golden grain
At midday with a wing aslant and limber;
And yellow cattle browsed upon the plain

It’s empty down the country I remember.

I had a sister lovely in my sight:
Her hair was dark, her eyes were very sombre;
We sang together in the woods at night.

It’s lonely in the country I remember.

The babble of our children fills my ears,
And on our hearth I stare the perished ember
To flames that show all starry thro’ my tears.

It’s dark about the country I remember.

There are the mountains where I lived.
The path Is slushed with cattle-tracks and fallen timber,
The stumps are twisted by the tempests’ wrath.

But that I knew these places are my own,
I’d ask how came such wretchedness to cumber
The earth, and I to people it alone.

It rains across the country I remember.

I shall forget you presently, my dear,
So make the most of this, your little day,
Your little month, your little half a year
Ere I forget, or die, or move away,
And we are done forever; by and by
I shall forget you, as I said, but now,
If you entreat me with your loveliest lie
I will protest you with my favorite vow.
I would indeed that love were longer-lived,
And vows were not so brittle as they are,
But so it is, and nature has contrived
To struggle on without a break thus far,—
Whether or not we find what we are seeking
Is idle, biologically speaking.

Every time the bucks went clattering
Over Oklahoma
A firecat bristled in the way.

Wherever they went,
They went clattering,
Until they swerved,
In a swift, circular line,
To the right,
Because of the firecat.

Or until they swerved,
In a swift, circular line,
To the left,
Because of the firecat.

The bucks clattered.
The firecat went leaping,
To the right, to the left,
And
Bristled in the way.

Later, the firecat closed his bright eyes
And slept.

My choice of all choice spots in Indian lands!

Hedged in, shut up by walls of purple hills,

That swell clear cut against our sunset sky,

Hedged in, shut up and hidden from the world.

As through it said, “I have no words for you;

I’m not part of you; your ways aren’t mine.”

Hedged in, shut up with low log cabins built—

How snugly!—in the quaint old fashioned way;

With fields of yellow maize, so small that you

Might hide them with your palm while gazing on

Them from the hills around them, high and blue.

Hedged in, shut up with long forgotten ways,

And stories handed down from sire to son.

Hedged in, shut up with broad Oktaha, like

A flash of glory curled among the hills!

How it sweeps away toward the morning,

Deepened here and younger by the beetling

Crag, the music of its dashings mingling

With the screams of eagles whirling over,

With its splendid tribute to the ocean!

And this spot, this nook is Tulledega;

Hedged in, shut up, I say by walls of hills,

Like tents stretched on the borders of the day,

As blue as yonder op’ning in the clouds!

I’m looking on the mountain,

I’m gazing o’er the plain;

I love the friends around me,

But wish for home again!

 

I hear their tones of kindness,

They soothe my every pain;

I know they love me truly—

I wish for that home again!

 

My mother’s grave is yonder,

And there it must remain;

My father’s care is tender,

I wish for home again!

 

My sisters and my brothers—

Alas! it may be vain,

This longing for beloved ones—

I wish for home again.

 

O, take me to my Nation,

And let me there remain;

This other world is strange, strange—

I wish for home again

 

Give me the western forest—

the mountain, stream and plain,

The shaded lawns of childhood—

Give me my home again!

 

The free breeze of the prairie

The wild bird’s joyous strain,

The three my father planted –

O, take me home again!

 

The sunshine and the flowers,

My mother’s grave again,

Give me my race and kindred—

O, take me home again!

I stand at the portal and knock,

And tearfully, prayerfully wait.

O! who will unfasten the lock,

And open the beautiful gate?

 

Forever and ever and ever,

Must I linger and suffer alone?

Are there none that are able to sever,

The fetters that keep me from home?

 

My spirit is lonely and weary,

I long for the beautiful streets.

The world is so chilly and dreary,

And bleeding and torn are my feet.

           Tahlequah, Cherokee Nation.

WĀʻEKAHI

O ke au i kahuli wela ka honua

O ke au i kahuli lole ka lani

O ke au i kukaiaka ka la.

E hoomalamalama i ka malama

O ke au o Makali’i ka po

O ka walewale hookumu honua ia

O ke kumu o ka lipo, i lipo ai

O ke kumu o ka Po, i po ai

O ka lipolipo, o ka lipolipo

O ka lipo o ka la, o ka lipo o ka po

                        Po wale hoi

                        Hanau ka po

 

At the time that turned the heat of the earth,

At the time when the heavens turned and changed,

At the time when the light of the sun was subdued

To cause light to break forth,

At the time of the night of Makalii (winter)

Then began the slime which established the earth,

The source of deepest darkness.

Of the depth of darkness, of the depth of darkness,

Of the darkness of the sun, in the depth of night,

                                    It is night,

                                    So was night born

 

 

Thou sing’st alone on the bare wintry bough,
As if Spring with its leaves were around thee now;
And its voice that was heard in the laughing rill,
And the breeze as it whispered o’er meadow and hill,
Still fell on thine ear, as it murmured along
To join the sweet tide of thine own gushing song.
Sing on—though its sweetness was lost on the blast,
And the storm has not heeded thy song as it passed,
Yet its music awoke in a heart that was near,
A thought whose remembrance will ever prove dear;
Though the brook may be frozen, though silent its voice,
And the gales through the meadows no longer rejoice,
Still I felt, as my ear caught thy glad note of glee,
That my heart in life’s winter might carol like thee.

1. Because pockets are not a natural right.

2. Because the great majority of women do not want pockets. If they did they would have them.

3. Because whenever women have had pockets they have not used them.

4. Because women are required to carry enough things as it is, without the additional burden of pockets.

5. Because it would make dissension between husband and wife as to whose pockets were to be filled.

6. Because it would destroy man’s chivalry toward woman, if he did not have to carry all her things in his pockets.

7. Because men are men, and women are women. We must not fly in the face of nature.

8. Because pockets have been used by men to carry tobacco, pipes, whiskey flasks, chewing gum and compromising letters. We see no reason to suppose that women would use them more wisely.

When the heavens with stars are gleaming

   Like a diadem of light, 

And the moon’s pale rays are streaming, 

   Decking earth with radiance bright; 

When the autumn’s winds are sighing, 

   O’er the hill and o’er the lea, 

When the summer time is dying, 

   Wanderer, wilt thou think of me? 

When thy life is crowned with gladness, 

     And thy home with love is blest, 

Not one brow o’ercast with sadness, 

     Not one bosom of unrest—

When at eventide reclining, 

    At thy hearthstone gay and free, 

Think of one whose life is pining, 

    Breathe thou, love, a prayer for me. 

Should dark sorrows make thee languish, 

     Cause thy cheek to lose its hue, 

In the hour of deepest anguish, 

     Darling, then I’ll grieve with you. 

Though the night be dark and dreary, 

     And it seemeth long to thee, 

I would whisper, “be not weary;” 

   I would pray love, then, for thee. 

Well I know that in the future, 

    I may cherish naught of earth; 

Well I know that love needs nurture, 

    And it is of heavenly birth.

But though ocean waves may sever 

     I from thee, and thee from me, 

Still this constant heart will never, 

    Never cease to think of thee.