Great Freshwater Seas Lyrics

The Great waters reflect time
Ageless myths foretold in skies
Ghosts speak in the grey waves
Passing fog of cemetery tides

A beacon lit in the mists
To light the way for coffin ships
All of creation in the isles above
To the call of those left in blood

The serpent that guards the shores
Among dark pines aglow
Thunder waters to drums arose
To swallow all in her cold


The incandescent stars of Pictured Rocks
The quarry of red stone blood and sun
Stood proud above her majestic view
Watched the birch bark passing from death anew

Celestial rainfall of Isle Royale
The wild land untouched, untamed
Damp odors of the forest claim
Black soil that hides her bones remains

Smoke pillars from cedar fires burn
Engulf the firs in ember spires turn
Cleansing the night for passage rites forlorn
Stag head wounded by the arrow in flight


Bonfires burn on Northland shores
Before the Moon shining bright above
Bathes Alder boughs in light

-Hiawatha

"With the odours of the forest,
With the dew and damp of meadows,
With the curling smoke of wigwams,
With the rushing of great rivers,
With their frequent repetitions,
And their wild reverberations,
As of thunder in the mountains
From the forests and the prairies,
From the great lakes of the Northland,

Ye who love the haunts of Nature,
Love the sunshine of the meadow,
Love the shadow of the forest,
Love the wind among the branches,
And the rain-shower and the snow-storm,
And the rushing of great rivers

By the rushing in the Spring-time,
By the alders in the Summer,
By the white fog in the Autumn,
By the black line in the Winter ;
And beside them dwelt the singer,
In the Yale of Tawasentha,
In the green and silent valley.

By the shores of Gitche Gumee,
By the shining Big-Sea-Water,
Stood the wigwam of Nokomis,
Daughter of the Moon, Nokomis.
Dark behind it rose the forest,
Rose the black and gloomy pine-trees,
Rose the firs with cones upon them;
Bright before it beat the water,
Beat the clear and sunny water,
Beat the shining Big-Sea-Water."


Shining Opal waters flow
The shores of Siskiwit gold
Boreal Twilight above shown
The Great Freshwater Seas cold

Spirited away to haunted shores
Spruce among the skyline soar
Wolf jaw carved in reverence
Songs of the Lakes persist

Ghost fires burn in the midnight skies
Cassiopeia upon her throne ignites
Speaking with the dryads in light
The warmth of the cabin invites

The moon is one with the sun
Rock harbors the secrets within
The ships that pass in the night
In the starlight it is written