Prologue: Overview
Yanaguana: Native River
A Tone Poem:
Music and Video by Daniel Parker,
Poem by Mo H Saidi
The video:
Down from the floating mists into a vast
cavity; the city’s treasure is the River
from a massive underground sea.
Locked beneath the limestone terrain
the aquifer gathers force and like a geyser
gushes in a torrent from the blue hole.
The Natives arrived to the green valley
some 12 millennia ago; their offspring
Payaya called the River, Yanaguana.
They hunted and fished, ate
pecans and prickly pear cacti
earth their God, the River their link.
Franciscans guarded by armed men
explored the serene valley. So friendly
were the Natives that the Spaniards
called them Tayshas, the land Tejas.
A military expedition arrived in 1691. An outpost
the Alamo mission was built in 1718, a city
grew along the banks of the River. To house
more neophytes, more missions were built.
For the next century, settlers came from north
and east---Americans seeking land---joined
Tejanos who broke away from the Mexican
Republic, proclaimed independent Texas.
Santa Anna’s troops surrounded the mission.
Under siege, Travis drew a line in the ground.
Cannons were fired before dawn
Mexicans breached brittle barricades.
All but one defendant were massacred
an ephemeral win
a heap of corpses aflame.
At San Jacinto, the cry
Remember the Alamo shook
the enemy’s camp
secured the new republic.
The Alamo remembers the heroes:
Esparza, Bowie, Travis
Seguin, Crockett, and Navarro.
Now the Native River hosts Fiestas
feeds the green basin, meanders through
hills covered with bluebonnets, groves
of mountain laurels and live oaks.
On the River Walk, Mariachi bands
celebrate the heritage, barges carry visitors
past boisterous cafes and theaters.
Today the Alamo is a Texas shrine
the River a city’s heart, mirror of its
heroic past that attracts throngs of people
with colorful faces. It runs through
vast farms, carries its tribute to the Gulf.
