Black Hawk Speaks at the Dedication of Black Hawk College

So,  you're naming a college for me.
How interesting.  There was a time
this forest was school for both of us,
badger, raccoon, mink, and fox,
our common literature.
You wanted it all,
so I had to fight you,
but you are generous in victory.

Now, I peer at these long low halls
woven hill to green hill
reminiscent of our own Sauk villages,
and the skills you will teach
I do approve--
auto mechanics, computer graphics,
basic building design--
useful things that advance the community
and increase, like our once prosperous fur trade,
the wealth of your tribe.

You'd think I'd be bitter, but
lying here, dead
I'm past all that.

Let the students come--
what harm could that be.
Let them study history.
Let them taste and feel the tragedies of the true,
see for themselves why they took
my land and livelihood from me.

All I ever wanted was the American Dream--
like your students here, like young Abe Lincoln
soon to play his part in the army
that massacred my people at Bad Axe Stream,
and long before the infamy of Wounded Knee
broke my heart.

                                            --John McBride

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