The Seer Poem by Robert James Campbell Stead

In the dingy dust of his deerskin tent sat the chief of a dying race,
And the lake that lapt at his wigwam door threw back a frowning face,
And a sightless squaw at the centre-pole crooned low in a hybrid speech,
When a man of God swept round the point and landed on the beach.

The heavy eyes grew bright with fire, the lips shaped to a sneer—
'Welcome, my paleface brother, what good news brings you here ?
Are you come with the voice of healing, with the book of your blameless breed,
To soothe my soul with comfort while my body gnaws with need ?

Welcome, O paleface brother; come, what have you to fear ?
Mayhap the redskin chieftain can teach as well as hear;
And while we sing your sacred songs and breathe your mystic prayer,
Who knows what inspiration may come on the ev'ning air ? . . .

Listen; you are a scholar, schooled in the pale-face lore:
Tis said a dying saint may sometimes see the shining shore;
That closing eyes peer far beyond the realm of mortal sight,—
Who knows but that a dying race may read the road aright ?

A dying race! We know it; the land is ours no more,
No more we roam the prairies as in the days of yore;
The brave, free spirit that was ours is crushed and passed away,
And bodies without spirits are predestined to decay.

' No matter. In the summertime the flowers bloom in the grass,
The startled insects flood the fields and chirrup as you pass,
The birds sing in the bushes; but before the wintry blast
The flowers and the insects and the little birds are past.

'Yet once again the spring will come, the flowers will bloom again,
And insects chirrup blithely where the former ones are lain;
The white snows of the winter-time will vanish in the heat,
And outdoor life and colour will follow their defeat.

Can the paleface read the riddle? Has he eyes to see the signs ?
Or thinketh he that snow will lie forever on the pines ?
That housed-up life can triumph for the mastery of state,
Or cushioned chairs produce a race destined to dominate ?

Behold, the things your hands have done, the power your arts have won—
Behold, those things shall vanish as the snow before the sun;
The snow that smothered out the red—ah, hear it if you can—
Shall leave the earth as suddenly, and leave it brown and tan.

Hear ye a little lesson — surely ye know its worth —
Only an outdoor nation can be master of the earth;
Soon as ye seek your couches, soft with the spoils of trade —
See well to your outer trenches before the mines are laid!

' Hear ye a little lesson—can ye the truth divine ?
Milk ye may mix with water, and water will mix with wine;
Mix as ye may on your prairies, mix in your hope and toil,
But know in all your mixing that water won't mix with oil!'

In the dingy dusk of his deerskin tent sat the chief of a dying race,
And the glow of holy prophecy lit up his rugged face,
And the foremost light of the setting sun fell far on an eastern land, —
And who shall save the paleface if he will not understand?