The circle of the Earth
is the head of a great drum.
With the day,
it moves upward--booming.
With the night,
it moves downward--booming.
The day and the night are its song.
I am very small,
as I dance upon the drumhead.
I am like a particle of dust,
as I dance upon the drumhead.
Above me in the sky
is the shining ball of the drumstick.
I dance upward with the day.
I dance downward with the night.
Some day I shall dance afar
into space like a particle of dust.
Who is the Drummer who
beats upon the Earth-drum?
Who is the Drummer who
makes me to dance his song?
--Ojibwa
Hartley Alexander, "American Indian Myth
Poems," Scribner's Magazine, Vol. 71, Jan 1922, p. 113.
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