On the Capture and Imprisonment of Crazy Snake, January, 1900
Down with him! chain him! bind him fast!
Slam to the iron door and turn the key!
The one true Creek, perhaps the last
To dare declare, “You have wronged me!”
Defiant, stoical, silent,
Suffers imprisonment!
Such coarse black hair! such eagle eye!
Such stately mien!—how arrow-straight!
Such will! such courage to defy
The powerful makers of his fate!
A traitor, outlaw,—what you will,
He is the noble red man still.
Condemn him and his kind to shame!
I bow to him, exalt his name!
From The Poems of Alexander Lawrence Posey (Crane & Co., 1910). This poem is in the public domain.
"Crazy Snake—Chitto Harjo. The leader of a band of Creeks who oppose the abolishment of their tribal rights. Several times Harjo has been imprisoned because of his defying the United States authorities."
—note from The Poems of Alexander Lawrence Posey (Crane & Co., 1910)
Alexander Posey
Alexander Posey, born August 3, 1873, was a Muskogee Creek poet, journalist, and humorist known for his poems and Fus Fixico letters.