Native American Poetry Quotes

#1. I think it's common sense to say that the longer away from a crime it gets prosecuted, the less deterrent effect there is.

Jed S. Rakoff

#2. Life on
Life on the reservation
Life on the reservation is dirty
Life on the reservation is dirty, filthy
Life on the reservation is dirty, filthy dogs.

(Dena Colhoff, student)

Timothy P. McLaughlin

#3. If an action must be taken that will benefit the majority at the cost of the minority, is it morally indefensible?
If an action taken for the benefit of a majority occurs at the expense of a minority, is it moral action?

Garth Nix

#4. He had always thought that a Native American should have shot Robert Frost for the outrageous lie of the line "The land was ours before we were the land's." What a scandal that would be, America's best-loved geezer falling in a battle over poetry.

Jim Harrison

#5. Where the mountain crosses.
On top of the mountain, I do not myself know where.
I wandered where my mind and my heart seemed to be lost.
I wandered away.

Jane Bierhorst

#6. When I heard that she was dead, I really suffered very little.

Geoffrey Household

#7. From my teenage years on, I sought out Native elders from many tribal nations and listened to their words. I also started a small press, The Greenfield Review Press, and became very involved with publishing the work of other American Indian authors, especially books of poetry.

Joseph Bruchac

#8. So Lightning says to Mud,
"What would happen if I struck your blood?"
And Mud says, "Brother,
It would hurt,
And make me the mother
Of every living thing.
But, Fire Boy, you ain't lifting my grass skirt
Until you burn me a ring.

Sherman Alexie

#9. No matter how hard I try to forget you, you always come back to my thoughts
When you hear me singing I am really crying for you.

Jane Bierhorst

#10. We weep,
tears of blood,
we weep,
In despair, crying,
we weep;
the sun forever has stolen
the light from his eyes.
No more his face do we see,
no more his voice do we hear,
nor will his affectionate gaze
watch over his people.

Jane Bierhorst

#11. When I view the world, I don't think of my own work. I think of my hope that, through art, people can get a sense of the type of invisible fabric that holds us all together, that holds the world together.

Jeff Koons

#12. Nations are not formed in a day, the formation requires years.

Mahatma Gandhi

#13. What the roses are saying cannot be heard through voice
but through beauty as you watch the rain slip
from their petals and hang from their edges.

(Dena Colhoff, student)

Timothy P. McLaughlin