At Crow's Nest Pass

At Crow's Nest Pass the mountains rend
Themselves apart, the rivers wend
    A lawless course about their feet,
    And breaking into torrents beat
In useless fury where they blend
        At Crow's Nest Pass.

The nesting eagle, wise, discreet,
Wings up the gorge's lone retreat
And makes some barren crag her friend
        At Crow's Nest Pass.

Uncertain clouds, half-high, suspend
Their shifting vapours, and contend
    With rocks that suffer not defeat;
    And snows, and suns, and mad winds meet
To battle where the cliffs defend
        At Crow's Nest Pass.

Emily Pauline Johnson

Emily Pauline Johnson was a Canadian poet of mixed Mohawk and English heritage. She was born on March 10, 1861, on the Six Nations Reserve near Brantford, Ontario. Johnson became known for her performances, where she often wore a traditional Mohawk dress. Her published works include poetry, short stories, and essays that explore themes of identity, cultural heritage, and nature. She passed away on March 7, 1913, in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Emily Pauline Johnson

The Cattle Thief

Emily Pauline Johnson, Simple Poetry

Moonset

Emily Pauline Johnson, Simple Poetry

Nocturne

Emily Pauline Johnson, Simple Poetry

The Happy Hunting Grounds

Emily Pauline Johnson, Simple Poetry

English

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The Flight Of The Crows

The autumn afternoon is dying o'er
    The quiet western valley where I lie
Beneath the maples on the river shore,
    Where tinted leaves, blue waters and fair sky
    Environ all; and far above some birds are flying by

To seek their evening haven in the breast
    And calm embrace of silence, while they sing
Te Deums to the night, invoking rest
    For busy chirping voice and tired wing -
    And in the hush of sleeping trees their sleeping cradles swing.

In forest arms the night will soonest creep,
    Where sombre pines a lullaby intone,
Where Nature's children curl themselves to sleep,
    And all is still at last, save where alone
    A band of black, belated crows arrive from lands unknown.

Strange sojourn has been theirs since waking day,<...

Emily Pauline Johnson

The Vagabonds

What saw you in your flight to-day,
Crows, awinging your homeward way?

Went you far in carrion quest,
Crows, that worry the sunless west?

Thieves and villains, you shameless things!
Black your record as black your wings.

Tell me, birds of the inky hue,
Plunderous rogues - to-day have you

Seen with mischievous, prying eyes
Lands where earlier suns arise?

Saw you a lazy beck between
Trees that shadow its breast in green,

Teased by obstinate stones that lie
Crossing the current tauntingly?

Fields abloom on the farther side
With purpling clover lying wide -

Saw you there as you circled by,
Vale-environed a cottage lie,

Girt about with emerald bands,
Nestling down in its meadow lands?

S...

Emily Pauline Johnson

Shadow River

MUSKOKA

A stream of tender gladness,
Of filmy sun, and opal tinted skies;
Of warm midsummer air that lightly lies
In mystic rings,
Where softly swings
The music of a thousand wings
That almost tones to sadness.

Midway 'twixt earth and heaven,
A bubble in the pearly air, I seem
To float upon the sapphire floor, a dream
Of clouds of snow,
Above, below,
Drift with my drifting, dim and slow,
As twilight drifts to even.

The little fern-leaf, bending
Upon the brink, its green reflection greets,
And kisses soft the shadow that it meets
With touch so fine,
The border line
The keenest vision can't define;
So perfect is the blending.

The far, fir trees that cover
The brownish hills with needles green and gold,

Emily Pauline Johnson

Thistle-Down

Beyond a ridge of pine with russet tips
The west lifts to the sun her longing lips,

Her blushes stain with gold and garnet dye
The shore, the river and the wide far sky;

Like floods of wine the waters filter through
The reeds that brush our indolent canoe.

I beach the bow where sands in shadows lie;
You hold my hand a space, then speak good-bye.

Upwinds your pathway through the yellow plumes
Of goldenrod, profuse in August blooms,

And o'er its tossing sprays you toss a kiss;
A moment more, and I see only this -

The idle paddle you so lately held,
The empty bow your pliant wrist propelled,

Some thistles purpling into violet,
Their blossoms with a thousand thorns afret,

And like a cobweb, shadowy and grey,
Far...

Emily Pauline Johnson

Rainfall

From out the west, where darkling storm-clouds float,
The 'waking wind pipes soft its rising note.

From out the west, o'erhung with fringes grey,
The wind preludes with sighs its roundelay,

Then blowing, singing, piping, laughing loud,
It scurries on before the grey storm-cloud;

Across the hollow and along the hill
It whips and whirls among the maples, till

With boughs upbent, and green of leaves blown wide,
The silver shines upon their underside.

A gusty freshening of humid air,
With showers laden, and with fragrance rare;

And now a little sprinkle, with a dash
Of great cool drops that fall with sudden splash;

Then over field and hollow, grass and grain,
The loud, crisp whiteness of the nearing rain.

Emily Pauline Johnson

The Happy Hunting Grounds

Into the rose gold westland, its yellow prairies roll,
World of the bison's freedom, home of the Indian's soul.
Roll out, O seas! in sunlight bathed,
Your plains wind-tossed, and grass enswathed.

Farther than vision ranges, farther than eagles fly,
Stretches the land of beauty, arches the perfect sky,
Hemm'd through the purple mists afar
By peaks that gleam like star on star.

Fringing the prairie billows, fretting horizon's line,
Darkly green are slumb'ring wildernesses of pine,
Sleeping until the zephyrs throng
To kiss their silence into song.

Whispers freighted with odour swinging into the air,
Russet needles as censers swing to an altar, where
The angels' songs are less divine
Than duo sung twixt breeze and pine.

Laughing into the fo...

Emily Pauline Johnson