Native Poetry in Canada: A Contemporary Anthology is the only collection of its kind. It brings together the poetry of many authors whose work has not previously been published in book form alongside that of critically-acclaimed poets, thus offering a record of Native cultural revival as it emerged through poetry from the 1960s to the present. The poets included here adapt English oratory and, above all, a sense of play. Native Poetry in Canada suggests both a history of struggle to be heard and the wealth of Native cultures in Canada today.
Comments
“In one of her poems Rita Joe writes, ‘I lost my talk/The talk you took away.’ In another, she claims, ‘And I will relate wonders to my people.’ The first statement brings us face-to-face with the attempted destruction of Native People and their rich and varied cultures, including their mother tongues. The second affirms the blessings that poems can bring to a particular people and to others who want to listen. What the poets in this anthology bring to the page is, indeed, a series of wonders. Such a gathering of writers and words, to borrow a phrase from Wayne Keon, makes ‘all the stars/cooperate/and come out shining.’” — Lorna Crozier, University of Victoria, winner of the Governor General’s Award for Poetry
“This collection shows the breadth of contemporary Native poetry, from the resistance literature of the many poems remembering the murdered Helen Betty Osborne to the playful fishing game of Daniel David Moses; it is an excellent anthology.” — Terry Goldie, York University, co-editor of An Anthology of Canadian Native Literature in English
“Armstrong and Grauer have arranged a collection of works of extraordinary breadth in their thematic treatment of cultural, political, and spiritual subjects. Instructors will value the accompanying biographical information, the substantial selections from each poet’s work, and the authors’ prefatory comments, all of which situate this collection as an ideal text for the university classroom.” — Canadian Literature
Four Decades: An Anthology of Canadian Native Poetry from 1960 to 2000, Jeannette C. Armstrong
Tuning Up, Tuning In, Lally Grauer
A Note on the Text
CHIEF DAN GEORGE
- A Lament for Confederation
Words to a Grandchild
If the legends fall silent
Keep a few embers from the fire
My people’s memory reaches
To a Native Teenager
I have known you
RITA JOE
- I am the Indian
Your buildings
Wen net ki’l/Who are you?
When I was small
Expect nothing else from me
She spoke of paradise
I Lost My Talk
Demasduit
The King and Queen Pass by on Train
Indian Talk
Migration Indian
The Legend of Glooscap’s Door
Sune’wit at Kelly’s Mountain
A Course of Study in School
Fishing and Treaty Rights
PETER BLUE CLOUD / ARIONWENRATE
- Alcatraz
When’s the Last Boat to Alcatraz?
Ochre Iron
Bear
Dawn
Crazy Horse Monument
Yellowjacket
Sweet Corn
Sandhills That None May Visit
Crow’s Flight
Searching for Eagles
Old Friends
DUKE REDBIRD
- The Beaver
The small drum
My moccasins
Tobacco Burns
The Ballad of Norval Morriseau
BETH BRANT
- Her Name Is Helen
Telling
Honour Song
Stillborn Night
MARIE ANNHARTE BAKER
- Granny Going
Penumbra
Moon Bear
Bird Clan Mother
Pretty Tough Skin Woman
Trapper Mother
Boobstretch
Raced Out to Write This Up
His Kitchen
Coyote Columbus Cafe
Tongue in Cheek, if not Tongue in Check
Coyote Trail
Bear Piss Water
I Want to Dance Wild Indian Black Face
SARAIN STUMP
- And there is my people sleeping
It’s with terror, sometimes
Little traces in my mind
I was mixing stars and sand
He goes away
Seven men on the rock upon the house
Like little hands
Round Dance
WAYNE KEON
- Heritage
nite
an opun letr tu bill bissett
a kind of majik
the eye of the raven
moosonee in august
Kirkland Lake, Sept. 21
eight miles from Esten Lake
in this village
for donald marshall
smoke nd thyme
i’m not in charge of this ritual
if i ever heard
Spirit Warrior Raven: Dream Winter
the apocalypse will begin
replanting the heritage tree
GORDON WILLIAMS
- The Last Crackle
Lost Children
Dark Corners
The Day Runs
Ernie
Creased Clinic
Justice in Williams Lake
JEANNETTE ARMSTRONG
- In-Tee-Teigh (King Salmon)
Death Mummer
Wind Woman
History Lesson
Dark Forests
Green
Rocks
World Renewal Song
Reclaiming Earth
Apples
Right It
BETH CUTHAND
- Zen Indian
Seven Songs for Uncle Louis
Were You There
Post-Oka Kinda Woman
For All the Settlers Who Secretly Sing
This Red Moon
LENORE KEESHIG-TOBIAS
- (a found poem)
At Sunrise
New Image
He Fights
In Katherine’s House
EMMA LaROCQUE
- Incongruence
Commitment
The Beggar
Nostalgia
The Red In Winter
“Progress”
The Uniform of the Dispossessed
My Hometown Northern Canada South Africa
Long Way From Home
RASUNAH MARSDEN
- Father
Condolences for Marius
Three Objects
Kinanti: A Fragment
Valley of the Believers
Wordmaker
Dancing the Rounds
OnYour Passage
Tossing Around
Yellow Leaves
SKYROS BRUCE / MAHARA ALLBRETT
- when the outside is completely dark
eels
in a letter frommy brother, atlantis
in/dian
the mountains are real
in memory of fred quilt
her husband is a film maker
For Menlo
Linda Louise
in the bath
Father
LEE MARACLE
- My Box of Letters
War
Performing
Women
Mister Mandela
Leonard
Razzleberries
Autumn Rose
Ta’ah
Light
GEORGE KENNY
- Rubbie at Central Park
Poor J.W.
How He Served
Death Bird
I Don’t Know This October Stranger
DUNCAN MERCREDI
- my red face hurts
Morning Awakening
Blues Singer
Betty
back roads
He Likes to Dance
something you said
born again indian
searching for visions
searching for visions II
dreaming about the end of the world
racing across the land
yesterday’s song
the duke of windsor
DANIEL DAVID MOSES
- Song in the Light of Dawn
A Song of Early Summer
October
The Sunbather’s Fear of the Moon
Twinkle
Ballad froma Burned-Out House
Of Course the Sky Does not Close
Crow Out Early
The Persistence of Songs
The Letter
The Line
Offhand Song
Could Raven HaveWhite Feathers?
Cowboy Pictures
JOAN CRATE
- The Poetry Reading
Can you hear me?
Gleichen
Story teller
I am a Prophet
Beaver Woman
Empty Seas
Departures
Sentences: at the Culls’
She is crying in a corner
Unmarked Grave
LOUISE HALFE
- Pahkahkos
Nohkom, Medicine Bear
She Told Me
Ukrainian Hour
Eatin’ Critters
Picking Leftovers
I’m So Sorry
In Da Name of Da Fadder
Der Poop
These are the Body’s Gifts
from Blue Marrow
MARILYN DUMONT
- The White Judges
Helen Betty Osborne
Blue Ribbon Children
Let the Ponies Out
Horse-Fly Blue
Letter to Sir John A. Macdonald
Circle the Wagons
Leather and Naughahyde
It Crosses My Mind
Instructions to My Mother
The Sky Is Promising
ARMAND GARNET RUFFO
- Poem for Duncan Campbell Scott
Some
Poetry
Surely Not Warriors
Grey Owl, 1935
Mirror
I Heard Them, I Was There
At Geronimo’s Grave
No Man’s Land
Bear
Fish Tale
Rockin’ Chair Lady
JOANNE ARNOTT
- Wiles of Girlhood
The Shard
In My Dance Class
Manitoba Pastoral
Proud Belly
Song About
My Grass Cradle
Like An Indian: Struggling With Ogres
Migration
Protection
MidLife
Beachhead Dreaming
CONNIE FIFE
- Ronnie, because they never told you why
Communications class
the revolution of not vanishing
This is not a metaphor
Stones memory
We remember
i have become so many mountains
dear walt
the naming
JOSEPH DANDURAND
- This was One of Them
I Touched the Coyote’s Tongue
Someone
Fort Langley
One year
Before me
Feeding the hungry
KATERI AKIWENZIE-DAMM
- stray bullets (oka re/vision)
my grandmothers
poem without end #3
my secret tongue and ears
from turtle island to aotearoa
partridge song
frozen breath and knife blades
hummingbirds
night falling woman
GREGORY SCOFIELD
- What a Way to Go
God of the Fiddle Players
Cycle (of the black lizard)
Unhinged
Pawâcakinâsîs-pîsim, December • The Frost Exploding Moon
Pêyak-Nikamowin • One Song
T. For
Not All Halfbreed Mothers
True North, Blue Compass Heart
I’ve Been Told
RANDY LUNDY
- my lodge
ritual
ghost dance
an answer to why
a reed of red willow
Ayiki-pisim/the Frog Moon (April)
Pawacakinasisi-pisim / The Frost-Exploding Moon (December)
stone gathering
deer-sleep
Acknowledgements
Jeannette Armstrong is a novelist and essayist, and one of Canada’s most highly respected poets; her most recent book is Whispering Shadows (Theytus Press, 2000).
Lally Grauer is a Professor in the English Department at Okanagan University College.
