"Dawendine" by E. Pauline Johnson
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-for
gotten 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 kins-
men be,
I accept thy belt of wampum; but my hate de-
mands for me
That they give their fairest treasure,
Ere I let thy kinsmen be.
"Dawendine, for thy singing, for thy suing, war
shall cease;
For thy name, which speaks of dawning, Thou shalt
be the dawn of peace;
For thine eyes whose purple shadows tell of dawn,
My hate shall cease.
"Dawendine, Child of Dawning, hateful are thy
kin to me;
Red my fingers with their heart blood, but my
heart is red for thee:
Dawendine, Child of Dawning,
"Wilt thou fail or follow me?"
And her kinsmen still are waiting her returning from
the night,
Waiting, waiting for her coming with her belt of
wampum white;
But forgetting all, she follows,
Where he leads through day or night.
There's a spirit on the river, there's a ghost upon
the shore,
And they sing of love and loving through the star-
light evermore,
As they steal amid the silence,
And the shadows of the shore.