Laments of the Land: Kinship through Echo in Native American Women’s Romantic Complaint Poetry

Abstract:This article explores the poems of three Native American women, identifying resemblances to traditional Romantic poetry in their depiction of lament, but also differences, namely in how land and the poet’s (or their speaker’s) relationship to it is represented through kinship. The mode of female complaint poetry is utilised as a productive frame for attending to these differences, offering a way to access their laments from a Romantic poetics. By exploring the complaint mode and its trope, the echo, this article considers how Indigenous kinship and reciprocity between the poet, speaker, and environment determines these women’s contribution to Romantic poetry.