James Thomas Stevens

James Thomas Stevens is a member of the Akwesasne Mohawk Tribe. James briefly attended the School of Visual Arts in New York City and Brooklyn College. He finished his undergraduate schooling at t...

Combing the Snakes from His Hair

James Thomas Stevens

Winner of the 2000 Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation $35,000 award, given annually to emerging writers of exceptional talent and promise

The title, Combing the Snakes from His Hair, alludes to an Iroquois story of healing. Atatarho, the Onondaga leader, had a crooked body and a head covered with snakes. In order to achieve peace, Atatarho had to be healed: his mind straightened, his body straightened, the snakes combed from his hair. Similarly, during the writing of these poems, Stevens experienced a healing, a setting straight of his life and a setting straight of the record.

The collection, written between 1993 and 1999, is comprised of five sections. The opening section, written as a way to explore new natural surroundings, is accompanied by the author's drawings of prairie flora. The second section is a series of love poems. The third section examines the relationship between European music and Native American music and observes that both should be viewed equally as expressive of each culture. And the fourth section consists of short poems—translations, if you will—of Iroquois stories and songs.

The final section consists of a long poem studying the effects of colonization coupled with an emotional contemplation of nature and one's place within it. It is concerned with language —who controls it, who possesses it, and how it is used by the colonizer to erase indigenous cultures.

"James Thomas Stevens braids language and silence, memory and longing, loss and renewal, into an utterly original and eloquent music."

—Arthur Sze, The Redshifting Web: Poems 1970-1998 and Archipelago

Reviews

"This man has a real flair for writing, a well written book."

- Noel Henry

The Plowman Press