74 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 
Whether it is the result of accident or 
intent, this appealing lyric has an almost 
perfect poetical construction. The re- 
peated phrases which are used so skill- 
fully here, are found in almost all ex- 
amples of Pueblo songs. The sentiment 
is simple, direct and fundamentally 
human; yet as we all know, such simple 
emotions are often hardest to express. 
In translating this song and the others 
that follow, I have taken no liberties with 
the text. 
not unlike English in the general order 
Tewa sentence construction is 
of words and in no case have I found it 
necessary to shift the order of a phrase. 
The ordinary prose seems to have many 
more connectives than does the poetry, 
which is characterized by condensation 
and by more or less conventionalized 
phrasing. Aside from following the text 
accurately in the matter of the meanings 
of words, I have endeavored to give some- 
thing of the atmosphere of the language 
which is peculiarly rich in exclamations. 
Words with such emotional connotation 
as “How I wish it were otherwise!” or 
s!” occur frequently. 
“What can I do, alas! 
The second song is supposed to have 
been originally sung by a boy from 
Tesuque Pueblo, at the trysting place to 
which the girl no longer came. 
Su k’wa k’e we na povi tsha nde 
I" povi i" povi ndo mu iri 
Ka"! na na ndi na re siti 
I" povi i" povi ndo mu iri 
Ts’e oki t’agi na povi tsha 
At Su k’wa k’e there used to bloom a flower — 
That flower, that flower, whene’er I see it now 
Alas, so far away, why then I weep; 
That flower, that flower, whene’er I see it now, 
For yellow, fresh and full-blown once it 
bloomed. 
This little song is interesting as a sus- 
tained metaphor. It may be noted in 
passing that Tewa children are usually 
given a name in accordance with the 
time of the year they are born. Flower 
hames are very frequently given to girls 
so the age-worn comparison of the girl 
and the flower fits in nicely with local 
usage. 
Certain phrases that recur in these two 
examples indicate that poetical forms 
are pretty well set. Like all home-loving 
people there is no phrase quite so sad as 
ka nyt na na ndi— “far, far away.” 
Even the men are not too brave to have 
recourse to tears when they think of the 
village in the green valley that holds 
their loved ones. 
Among the most charming of all songs 
are lullabys. The Tewa mother singing 
her little baby to sleep sometimes takes 
advantage of what we call sympathetic 
magic, to achieve her purpose. The 
song is addressed not to the child but a 
bird called “Puye.” This bird is very 
sleepy by nature and of course has power 
to teach the child to follow its example. 
My earlier informants seemed to think 
that the little puye birds are bats but an 
old woman of Santa Clara declares they 
are not bats but instead small drowsy 
birds that live in the high mountains. 
In former times these birds were tamed 
as household pets and their sleep-pro- 
ducing faculties were appealed to by the 
mothers of erying children. 
There are many sleepy little birds, 
Sleepy little birds, sleepy little birds, 
So go to sleep, my little girl, 
My little Frosted-Cockle-Burr, 
O, come you sleepy little birds 
And slumber on her hollow eyes 
That she may sleep the livelong day, 
That she may sleep the livelong night. 
You may have noticed that the name 
of the child is interpolated in the song. 
The little girl of my informant was born 
in the winter time and was named 
Frosted-Cockle-Burr. 
When children grow up so they can 
talk and run about they soon learn to 
fear the Siveyo Sendo or “Giant Canni- 
