Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.
- The narrator reminds us that bad news tends to come in clusters. So we join Minnehaha and Old Nokomis in Hiawatha's wigwam. They're waiting for him to come back from hunting. But when the wigwam opens, two strange women come inside without saying a word.
- Hiawatha comes home and lays a deer at the feet of his wife. He notices the two strangers in the corner and wonders what's up.
- Once Hiawatha has divided up the deer, the women spring from the corner and devour all the best parts that were reserved for Minnehaha. They retreat back to their dark corner when they're done.
- Days go by and the women stay. During the day, they hang out in the corner. But at night they go into the forest and bring back firewood.
- Every night at supper, the women take the best parts of Hiawatha's food. No one questions them and they retreat to their corner.
- One night, Hiawatha wakes up to find the women crying in the firelight. He asks them why they're so sad. They answer that they are ghosts of dead women and they have come to warn him on behalf of his dead friend Chibiabos.
- The women tell Hiawatha that the people in the realm of the dead are tired of being burdened with all of people's mourning. They just want to get on with their afterlives and be left alone. The women want Hiawatha to tell people not to be so over-the-top with their mourning for dead loved ones. They also ask that Hiawatha's people stop burying their loved ones with a bunch of stuff like kettles, arrows, and all sorts of other stuff (which is a custom among some tribes). They say that these things just weigh people down in the next life.
- Once they're satisfied that Hiawatha will follow their advice, the women leave.