Best Sioux Poems

Blueberry Festival In Sioux Lookout

Travel north off the Trans-Canada
On Highway seventy-two,
And cross the Frog Rapid Narrows
Of the English River system
To enter Sioux Lookout,
On Pelican Lake,
‘Hub of the North’
And gateway to Lac Seul.

Legend has it and told by the elders,
That in days past,
A mountain
Was used by...

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An angry girl can throw a punch
That makes a man toss up his lunch
To co-exist
Avoid her fist
By giving her a Nestlé Crunch!...

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tepee flap open
you are welcome in my friend
rattle it when closed
except when two sticks are crossed
there’s no need to start a war

8/16/2018...

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Whisper is jealous of Josh's black leather boots and Katie's fur lined boots, so they have a threesome to make up for it. They frolic in the moonlight, playing the oboe, xylophone, and vacuum, drooling and spanking each other. Then, the platypus, jackal, and whale...

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I ran across a prayer to the Earth 
written many years ago by the Lakota Sioux
and mixing my words in with theirs…
I’d like to share this prayer with you:

Oh Great Spirit..whose voice I hear in the wind
and whose breath has given life and innocence to...

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Native American Translations

Cherokee Travelers' Blessing I
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

I will extract the thorns from your feet.
For yet a little while, we will walk life's sunlit paths together.
I will love you like my own brother, my own blood.
When you are disconsolate, I will wipe...

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Illahee.  Awenasa, Mahkah.

The lesson Momma taught me
(which momma never taught me)
was -

No, is.

To not be angry.
To endure your pain.
To let be as things be.
To not multiply your pain
by fletching and loosing blame.
Bend the bow into a bow,
offer connection.
Seeing.
Welcoming.

The lesson Momma taught me
(which momma never...

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Crazy Horse's Naming Vision
by Michael R. Burch

Earthbound,
and yet I now fly
through these clouds that are aimlessly drifting...
so high
that no sound
echoing by
below where the mountains are lifting
the sky
can be heard.

Like a bird,
but not meek,
like a hawk from a distance regarding its prey,
I will shriek,
not a word,
but...

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During the Civil War, money came late,
Indians starved, left to their fate.
Two braves came across a white farmer's food.
They were hungry and stressed and in a bad mood.

Little Bear picked up an egg, Grey Elk said no.
Some things we can't do, some places can't go.
This...

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Tashunka Witko, better known as Crazy Horse, had a vision of a red-tailed hawk at Sylvan Lake, South Dakota. In his vision he saw himself riding a spirit horse, flying through a storm, as the hawk flew above him, shrieking. When he awoke, a red-tailed...

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Four faces
ten cows
40 people
a river runs through it
Aberdeen Rapid City Sioux Falls
crops of corn soybeans 
hog factory ethanol highway interstate 
flat plains shadow of Rockies
sparse vast country music cowboy hats
pickups tractors American flag whackos
jacks coyotes
buffalo paddlefish grasshoppers deer crows
vulture walleye pheasants otters cattle grain
green sky...

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Wedding  dress rides bicycle.
She cracked ribs staring in my window. 
                        Crocodile teardrops jail cell.
Peat shale lignite.
    ...

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I long to dance and chant around the orange crackling fire in front of my tribe, the Sioux
Hot humid July night.
Sweat and passion.
Kick up the dust from my ancestors teachings.
Yip and scream my heart's desire. 
We are one. 
God is to be feared.
He made us...

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Dream Song of the Thunders
Chippewa saying
translation by Michael R. Burch

Sometimes I bemoan my “plight”
when all the while
the wind bears me across the immense sky.


What is life?
The flash of a firefly.
The breath of the winter buffalo.
The shadow scooting across the grass that vanishes with sunset.
—Blackfoot saying,...

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snaps cowgirl Indian boyfriend 
The sound of buffalo meat on her teeth,
Taste the smell of sleep,
Cannabis wafting,
Chew the diamond, steal the slipper,
Call the captain and skinny dipper.
The palm fronds climb.
Squaw walks whiskey hills

Eyes cracked wide shut
Gripped by the hunger of a world,
 chasing visions
The moon...

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