How can one visit the Pacific Northwest and not take a photo of a totem pole? (True, Chicago has one located in a park on the Lakeshore, in the North Side neighborhood of Lakeview, as well as one in the Field Museum, but it's not the same thing.) I love totem poles and the mythical stories they relate. Walking around Seattle as much as I was doing, trying to get in as much as possible within a short timeframe, I didn't think to see if an informational plaque was provided at the bottom of this totem pole, but that should not stop us from enjoying its beauty.
Many types of birds are represented in the totem poles of the Pacific Northwest Native peoples, but I feel reasonably certain that the bird depicted above is that of a raven. I love ravens, which are also populous throughout the Southwest, especially in northern New Mexico, and feature in the mystical beliefs of the Native peoples there, but I especially love the trickster raven of Pacific Northwest folklore. Check out Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth and Art by Lewis Hyde, which is an excellent book I've read on the meaning of trickster myths in cultures around the world, including the Pacific Northwest raven myth.
The biodiversity of the land is represented here.
Here is an overview of the same totem pole, in the context of the park at Pioneer Square.
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