“Road” by Joy Harjo
We stand first in our minds, and then we toddle
From hand to furniture
Soon we are walking away from the house and lands
Of our ancestral creator gods
To the circles of friends, of schooling, of work
Making families and worlds of our own.
We make our way through storm and sun
We walk side by side against each other
The last road will be taken alone—
There might be crowds calling for blood
Or a curtained window by the leaving bed
It is best to not be afraid
Lift your attention
For the appearance of the next road
It might be through a family of trees, a desert, or
On rolling waves of sea
It’s the ancient road the soul knows
We always remember it when we see it
It beckons at birth
It carries us home
The Southeast was covered with Mississippian mound builder cities and communities a century before Spanish arrival in the Southeast. The Southeast is still covered with the remains of mounds. There are even mounds on the University of Tennessee, Knoxville campus. These mounds might be leveled by shovels, tractors or hate, but they will show up on any energetic geophysical map. They continue to exist in memory, in memory maps.
It is said that Monahwee got his warrior name Hopothepoya (Crazy Wat Hunter) from stealing horses in Knoxville. Knoxville was a traditional Mvskoke territory, therefore, the horses were not technically stolen. They were on stolen lands.
When I returned to these homelands I came by old trails. One of the most traveled trails is part of Interstate 40.
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Food for Thought—
- Why does Harjo emphasize that “[t]he last road will be taken alone”? What is she suggesting here?
- Harjo says, “It is best not to be afraid / Lift your attention / For the appearance of the next road”: What does this mean in your own life?
- Harjo finishes the poem with “We always remember it when we see it / it beckons at birth / It carries us home.” What does “it” represent for you?
- What do you make of the brief explanation Harjo adds to the end of the poem? How does it enlighten your understanding of the poem?
- Why do some separate themselves from religion as they grow older?