The Sleeping Giant
Emily Pauline Johnson
(THUNDER BAY, LAKE SUPERIOR)
When did you sink to your dreamless sleep
Out there in your thunder bed?
Where the tempests sweep,
And the waters leap,
And the storms rage overhead.
Were you lying there on your couch alone
Ere Egypt and Rome were born?
Ere the Age of Stone,
Or the world had known
The Man with the Crown of Thorn.
The winds screech down from the open west,
And the thunders beat and break
On the amethyst
Of your rugged breast,
But you never arise or wake.
You have locked your past, and you keep the key
In your heart 'neath the westing sun,
Where the mighty sea
And its shores will be
Storm-swept till the world is done.
The sleeping giant is a rock formation jutting out into Thunder Bay that is said to resemble a sleeping giant. The Sibley Peninsula on which it sits is now a National Park. An Ojibway legend says that the giant was turned to stone after a secret silver lode was revealed to white men.
