Two Wounded Knees

TWO WOUNDED KNEES by Carol Markstrom (BMI)
VERSE 1
I stood on hallowed ground at Wounded Knee.
Unexpected tears streaming down my face.
A Lakota woman reached out to comfort me.
With a knowing look, she gave me a bundle of sage.
I felt collective memory in that space.
CHORUS
You can't take land from a good guy.
So call him a savage and all is justified.
There’s no righting some wrongs.
There’s no bringing back those slain and gone.
We won’t forget them and their progenies.
We remember two Wounded Knees.
Eighteen ninety. Nineteen seventy-three.
VERSE 2
1890 – The People were broken and oppressed.
Then a vision brought hope for despair.
Dance and sing, seek peace, the ghost shirt would protect.
But the soldiers were suspicious of warfare.
Lakota didn’t know what was coming in their next nightmare.
VERSE 3
A cold bitter day they took away the Indians guns.
Tensions were high and a spark lit the flame.
In minutes, Hotchkiss guns killed old and the young.
White snow drenched with blood of the hundreds slain.
It’s there in the collective memory of that space.
VERSE 4
1973 – They were broken and oppressed.
Like the days of the Ghost Dance, dreams lay threadbare.
Indians in the city faced harassment and stress.
On the reservation, poverty and despair.
20th century justice wasn’t there.
VERSE 5
The young looked to their roots to unite and coalesce.
Make good on the treaties; lift the weight.
They made their stand at Wounded Knee with no regret.
They heard the spirits of those who died in that place.
They felt collective memory in that space.
CHORUS