Portrait of Osceola

Portrait Of Osceola

The revealing marks of the Indian face,
pressed beautifully, parched in the hot heat
comes to Walt, as he is born echoing through
time creating savagely the works of which
none other could tell. I see him loom high
above on a rocky ledge, studying the
American Indian,
keeping his special signs for them. Friendship rises
and falls with the breath of his friend the
painter, Catlin.
Oh, in his ways, Walt created the shade over
a bewitched primrose garden, sitting like a
a very ghost in front of me on a wrought-iron bench
meditating in the heat.

“Under glass,” I say to him.
“Yes, it was a “Trail of Tears.” Walt lowers his
head, perspiring in his handkerchief, "It's going to rain."

I can see them in your eyes that beckoned me at that age
into the lives of the Choctow,Creek, and Chickasaw.
as they, the Cherokee women crossed with their men
from the Mississippi and into Oklahoma Territory,
Walt Whitman remained in his poetry, larger than life.

Oh, spiritual brother! Oh! The Mohawk know you too
with wisdom through the notes that fold in your breast pocket,
words from your detailed notebooks,
all about a “red squaw”. My mother sleeps alone as if
forever in my dreams. She is well, Walt, she is well.


Written exclusively for The Native American Picture Prompt Contest
September 2010