Symbol Analysis
Mishe-Nahma's skeleton only shows up for a handful of lines in The Song of Hiawatha, but it is without doubt one of the most powerful images in the entire poem. After Hiawatha has killed Nahma by punching him in the heart, he calls on his sea-gull friends to help him escape Nahma's body after being swallowed. The sea-gulls are happy to oblige because they want to eat the fish either way. So they totally go to town (along with Hiawatha's grandmother Nokomis). As the poem says, "Three whole days and nights/alternate/Old Nokomis and the sea-gulls/ Stripped the oily flesh of Nahma" (8.256-259).
By the time the seagulls and Nokomis are done, there's nothing left of Nahma except his skeleton. The image is one of total death and absence, as we read: "[T]he waves washed through the rib-bones,/ Till the sea-gulls came no longer,/ And upon the sands lay nothing/ But the skeleton of Nahma" (8.260-8.264). Isn't that just the most chilling thing you've ever heard? The image of the waves washing through the rib bones also reminds us that Nahma's skeleton has become a part of the natural landscape, even though it belonged to one of the world's fiercest monsters only a week earlier. That's how thin the line between life and death can be.
- Lines 256-264: These eight lines mark the only place where we see the skeleton of Nahma. But just read them back to yourself and try not to get goose bumps. The lines describe how the body of the monster Nahma slowly decays and gets eaten until there's nothing left but the bones on the beach.