Modern Myths Scholarship Poem

The dissuassion of engagement from myth is not a symptom of modern society, but of a western society.

Hundreds of cultures still wrap themselves in cloaks made from their stories. A hide woven together by the tongues of ancestors, wagging epics of the spiritual, of the monsters that lurk beneath the ground or the gods that soar above our heads. This is one of the many stories of the Athabaskan people, native to the Yukon.

Thunder crashes

The crack of great wings against the darkened skies. 

It echoes off the mountains, invoking a chorus of cries from the creatures that make their roost in the stone. 

Raven, 

Ever curious, 

Ever scheming, 

Turns his beady eyes upwards 

Gazing upon the waves of the ocean as they are suspended above him. 

And through the spray of rain, 

Behind the lightning curtain, 

He spots the god who blankets his crowning jewels 

He finds the Thunderbird

Who’s belly scrapes against the gray towers that rise to meet him

He calls, the sound shaking the sky. 

Wings as wide as the horizon beat, 

Shaking their water down upon the earth

The people so small scatter to their buildings as he passes

Sending down showers in a torrential roar

Lightning flies from beneath the great bird, 

Finding its home in the heart of the wicked. 

The storm rolls by

Riding on the tail of its creator

Like a child that clings to its mother for life

And as the Thunderbird moves

The winds fade

The rains stop

The thunder draws to close

For the Thunderbird has come and gone

Leaving only peace in its wake