The Start Of Working On Rhyming

2017 - Here I sit all brokenhearted...

(Trying to miizii but only boogidid)

Some of our best thoughts can come from the least expected places.

Miiziwigamig is where I was

when I tied my shoelaces.

For this little piggy went to market.

Bemidjigamag

Bemidjigamig

This little pig went to market.

To market to market to buy new shoes

To buy new shoes without shoe laces.

Of all the places...

The pioneer press is bound to know

and how is this for news on the go.

A bit of an explanation now if you are unfamiliar with the Ojibwe language!

I went to Bemidji, Minnesota, a town I grew up in. I went to buy some slip-on shoes as I wasn't having any luck finding a pair where I was living.

While in Bemidji, we stopped to eat at a pizza place. At that pizza place, they had a welcome sign on the door in the Ojibwe language. While in the pizza place I noticed the sign Miiziwigamig, which to me means shit house! I couldn't stop laughing!

I then thought, why would they have a sign like that in a sit-down pizza place? I asked my niece who met me there and she had to get up and go look as even though she lives about 15 minutes from there, she had not seen the sign.

When she came back she said that it was the bathroom sign. Thank goodness! I thought the sign meant the pizza place was a shithouse and I wondered if it was the owner's sense of humor or the Native American person that helped them with the signs that had the sense of humor.

This is a rhyme early in my learning. It is a type of nonsense rhyme unless you know a bit about what I am talking about. Only then will it make more sense. Bemidji/Lake Bemidji in Ojibwe is Bemijigamaag. The Pioneer Press is the city newspaper. I was wondering why the paper didn't pick this up.

I hadn't heard that word for bathroom. I didn't hear it growing up. It is used that way, however, it struck me funny as it literally means shit house. And boogidi means h/she farts.

Nanaboozhoo Rhyme Two description: Wenabozho/manaboozhoo/nanaboozhoo - Ojibwe language for trickster in different dialects.

Ojibwe language: zhigog - skunk, waboos - rabbit, miigizi - eagle, gookoosh - pig

Dakota/Lakota/Nakota language for trickster: Iktomi - spider

Nanaboozhoo

Stories I heard told

Wenabozho

Manaboozhoo too

Oral tradition is very old.

Some teachings are better than gold.

We learn of Zhigog and waboos

Of miigizi and gookoosh

Then there is Iktomi, from Dakota

Coyote, from further west yet.

We learn many lessons

From these old teachings, you can bet.

I cry for those who do not know

Their own people's preachings,

I'm sure time has changed one

As sure as my memory has done

I am not a sage

And sure to age

And forget everyone.

A few are written

Sometimes different

From the ones I used to hear

Sometimes in my beer

It's okay, as the lesson takes today

The teaching is good in every way.

You can Google, you can ask an elder

Ask your family if they remember

Even ask the welder.

Find a book

The stories can hook

Learn the language

Better in the language I was told

A story of Iktomi in Lakota

A fun-filled language the translator sold

It's bold and descriptive and hard to translate

To make it the same for all on this date.

The lesson was clear to me

Not as much laughter as from the storyteller you see.

She told of Iktomi

Covered with a blanket and beaten with sticks.

And it may have even been seen as a bit sick.

If the message wasn't so strong to say

We will not tolerate incest today or any day!