“Oklahoma” by Ernest Hemingway

An early poem.

“Oklahoma”

Ernest Hemingway

All of the Indians are dead

(A good Indian is a dead Indian)

Or riding in motor cars—

(the oil lands, you know, they’re all rich)

Smoke smarts my eyes,

Cottonwood twigs and buffalo dung

Smoke grey in the teepee—

(Or is it myopic trachoma)

The prairies are long,

The moon rises,

Ponies

Drag at their pickets.

The grass has gone brown in the summer—

(or is the hay crop failing)

Pull an arrow out:

If you break it

The wound closes.

Salt is good too

And wood ashes.

Pounding it throbs in the night—

(or is it the gonorrhea)