The Flower-Fed Buffaloes

Vachel Lindsay

Background

Vachel Lindsay was born in 1879 in Illinois, USA. He often sold his poetry on the streets and made long walking expeditions, trading his poetry on the way in exchange for food and lodging.

Line 1: It is hard to estimate how many buffalo once roamed North America but it is thought that there would have been between 30 and 75 million. By the time Lindsay was writing there were about 300.

Line 3: the first railroad in the area was the Illinois and Central Railroad chartered in 1851. The construction of the railroad hastened the depletion of the buffaloes. Shooting the beast from the windows of the railroad by passengers was popular and widely advertised.

Line 14: Blackfeet and Pawnees are two American native tribes. The population of the Pawnees in the early nineteenth century was about twenty to twenty-five thousand, but it declined rapidly in the later part of the nineteenth century mostly because of smallpox and cholera, but also through falling prey to traditional enemies.

Sound is extremely important in this poem.  Much Lindsay`s poetry was written for the voice and he presented most of his poem orally.  What are the dominant sounds in this poem and are there any patterns of sound?  Once you`ve found these sounds and patterns try and explain what you think the effect of this technique is.  Does it emphasise any aspect of the poem?

Setting is vividly created in the opening four lines.  Together with the dominant sounds in these lines ( a sibilant “ess” and an almost recumbent “oh”) what scene is being created and what is the emotion felt by the poet?  At the end of the third line there´s a slightly discordant clashing of ess sounds, which contrasts with the more poised concord of sounds in the first two lines.  Identify this and explain what the effect is.  Is the season important in any way?

Subject and theme – concerned with the passing of time and the loss of habitat.  How does the poet evoke these ideas and what is the tone of his comment?  What are the words used to describe the buffaloes?  How effectively and completely do you think the poet has captured their character in the poem?

Repetition – related also to sound but important by itself.  There seems to be a slight shift in the meaning of  the idea to “lie low”.  What is the context of this and how does that meaning shift from line 4 to the last three lines of the poem?

General comment on the poem can perhaps relate to the idea of development  and human intrusion into wild habitats and environments.  What is the poet`s comment and what do you think of it?  Could you use any visual stimuli to help show this?