Susan Kay Anderson: The girl of Voss watches the Indian girls of the 4-H Club at play

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4-H Club girls at 4-H Camp: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1931 (National Archives and Records Administration)

I am the girl of Voss
watching the Indian girls
of the 4-H Club at play
saving up
for the time
when I will run
as they do
over the dusty ground
with pants
and not checking the clouds
and not looking for
my reindeer
or where commas may
go or not go

A Lapp family, Norway, c. 1890: photochrome print, Detroit Publishing Co., 1905 (Library of Congress)

Ben Defender Jr with the Alta corn he grew in Kenel District [South Dakota]: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1930 (National Archives and Records Administration)
 

Jacob Jordan in his 4-H cornfield: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1930 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Baseball game at the Standing Rock Fair: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1935 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Baseball game in progress, Standing Rock Agency: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1940 (National Archives and Records Administration)

 
Sack race following the rain: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1939 (National Archives and Records Administration)

 
Baseball player in the batting circle: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1940 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Basketball team: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1940 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Football squad from Project 182: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1938 (National Archives and Records Administration)

 
Boarding the train to begin service in the Army: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1941 (National Archives and Records Administration)

4-H Club leaders: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1930 (National Archives and Records Administration)

 
Big Head Tribal Council meeting group: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1932 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Log cabin with wagon parked beside it. A stark study in Plains Indian dwellings: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1938 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Log house with a sod roof: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1939 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Women and child in front of cabin made of what appears to be scrap lumber: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1938 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Camp tents in the winter: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1938 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Family camp near Kenel, South Dakota: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, 1939 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Two Indian Children. They sit in front of a cabin door; the little girl is crying: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c. 1939 (National Archives and Records Administration)

Telephone maintenance lineman: photographer unknown for U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Standing Rock Agency, c.1935 (National Archives and Records Administration)

View of Smeerenburg, Spitzbergen, Norway, c. 1890: photochrome print, Detroit Publishing Co., 1905 (Library of Congress)

Grotto in Suphellebrae, Sognefjord, Norway, c. 1890: photochrome print, Detroit Publishing Co., 1905 (Library of Congress)

Smeerenburg at Danskerne, Spitzbergen, Norway, c. 1890: photochrome print, Detroit Publishing Co., 1905 (Library of Congress)

Praekestolen, Geiranger Fjord, Norway, c. 1890: photochrome print, Detroit Publishing Co., 1905 (Library of Congress)

Kongen og Dronningen, Bispen, Norway, c. 1890: photochrome print, Detroit Publishing Co., 1905 (Library of Congress)

You may ask why it is that scenes from the Old Country by the Fjords should be running through the mind of the girl of Voss on the day of the 4-H Club Fair at Standing Rock Agency. A Fair question. Can it be that, so far from home, she does not really feel so far away after all?  Or that, on the other hand, while not actually so far away in a literal sense, in another deeper sense she yet feels more remote than ever from that impossible past, and closer than ever before to being able to touch those dreams which have always been running away from her, like swiftly drifting and melting ice floes, or bits of dry grass tossed high in the air and blown off on the high plains wind?