Poetry Archives

On the Spirit-Island [CH] sitting under midnight’s misty moon,
Lo I see the spirits flitting o’er the waters one by one!
Slumber wraps the silent city, and the droning mills are dumb;
One lone whippowil’s shrill ditty calls her mate that ne’er will   come.
Sadly moans the mighty river, foaming down the fettered falls,
Where of old he thundered ever o’er abrupt and lofty walls.
Great Unktehee—god of waters—lifts no more his mighty head;
Fled he with the timid otters?—lies he in the cavern dead?
Hark!—the waters hush their sighing and the whippowil her call,
Through the moon-lit mists are flying dusky shadows silent all.
Lo from out the waters foaming—from the cavern deep and dread—
Through the glamour and the gloaming comes a spirit of the dead.
Sad she seems; her tresses raven on her tawny shoulders rest;
Sorrow on her brow is graven, in her arms a babe is pressed.
Hark!—she chants the solemn story—sings the legend sad and old,
And the river wrapt in glory listens while the tale is told.
Would you hear the legend olden hearken while I tell the tale—
Shorn, alas, of many a golden, weird Dakota chant and wail.

[CH] The small island of rock a few rods below the Falls, was called by
the Dakotas Wanagee We-ta—Spirit-Island. They say the spirit of
Anpetu Sapa sits upon that island at night and pours forth her sorrow
in song. They also say that from time out of mind, war-eagles nested on
that island, until the advent of white men frightened them away. This
seems to be true. See Carver’s Travels (London, 1778), p. 71.