Jane Johnstone Schoolcraft

Não conhecia o nome de Jane Johnstone Schoolcraft, mas fiquei a conhecer hoje. É a mais antiga escritora americana índia de que se tem conhecimento, e o seu nome nativo significa qualquer coisa como "som das estrelas a correr pelo céu".

Acerca da sua obra temos o estudo de Robert Dale Parker, precisamente com o título The Sound the Stars Make Rushing Through the Sky (University of Pennsylvania, 2007).

Eis um excerto em inglês do seu poema Song for a Lover Killed in Battle:

Oh how can I sing the praise of my love! His spirit still lingers

around me. The grass that is growing over his bed of earth is yet

too low; its sighs cannot be heard upon the wind.

Oh he was beautiful!

Oh he was brave!

I must not break the silence of this still retreat; nor waste the

time in song, when his spirit still whispers to mine. I hear it in the

sounds of the newly budded leaves. It tells me that he yet lingers

near me, and that he loves me the same in death, though the

yellow sand lies over him.

Whisper, spirit,

Whisper to me.

I shall sing when the grass will answer my plaint; when its sighs

will respond to my moan. There my voice shall be heard in his

praise.

Linger, lover! linger

Stay, spirit! stay.