Having defrauded us of our land, the paleface forced us away. But the paleface has stolen our lands and driven us hither. "There is what the paleface has done! Since then your father too has been buried in a hill nearer the rising sun. Setting the pail of water on the ground, my mother stooped, and stretching her left hand out on the level with my eyes, she placed her other arm about me she pointed to the hill where my uncle and my only sister lay buried. Stamping my foot on the earth, I cried aloud, "I hate the paleface that makes my mother cry!"
I looked up into my mother's face while she spoke and seeing her bite her lips, I knew she was unhappy. "My little daughter, he is a sham, – a sickly sham! The bronzed Dakota is the only real man." "Mother, who is this bad paleface?" I asked. With a strange tremor in her voice which I could not understand, she answered, "If the paleface does not take away from us the river we drink." So I said: "Mother, when I am tall as my cousin Warca-Ziwin, you shall not have to come for water. Their wigwam was not far from ours and I saw her daily going to and from the river. My grown-up cousin, Warca-Ziwin (Sunflower), who was then seventeen, always went to the river alone for water for her mother. One time, on such a return, I remember a bit of conversation we had. Returning from the river, I tugged beside my mother, with my hand upon the bucket I believed I was carrying. It was as if I were the activity, and my hands and feet were only experiments for my spirit to work upon. I was not wholly conscious of myself, but was more keenly alive to the fire within. Having gone many paces ahead I stopped, panting for breath, and laughing with glee as my mother watched my every movement. She taught me no fear save that of intruding myself upon others.
These were my mother's pride, – my wild freedom and overflowing spirits.
American indian free#
Loosely clad in a slip of brown buckskin, and light-footed with a pair of soft moccasins on my feet, I was as free as the wind that blew my hair, and no less spirited than a bounding deer. "Hush my little daughter must never talk about my tears" and smiling through them, she patted my head and said, "Now let me see how fast you can run today." Whereupon I tore away at my highest possible speed, with my long black hair blowing in the breeze. Then I clung to her hand and begged to know what made the tears fall.
American indian full#
Often she was sad and silent, at which times her full arched lips were compressed into hard and bitter lines, and shadows fell under her black eyes.
Always, when my mother started for the river, I stopped my play to run along with her. Here, morning, noon, and evening, my mother came to draw water from the muddy stream for our household use. A footpath wound its way gently down the sloping land till it reached the broad river bottom creeping through the long swamp grasses that bent over it on either side, it came out on the edge of the Missouri. Impressions of an Indian ChildhoodĪ WIGWAM of weather-stained canvas stood at the base of some irregularly ascending hills. The Widespread Enigma of Blue-Star Woman 159 Lecturer Author of "Old Indian Legends," "Americanize the First American," and other stories Member of the Woman's National Foundation, League of American Pen-Women, and the Washington Salon " There is no great there is no small in the mind that causeth all " Washington: Hayworth Publishing House, 1921. American Indian Stories.Īmerican Indian Stories by Zitkala-Sa (1876-1938).
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