Miko Kings

“Photography has always had the ability to record the visible world with a kind of notional truth.”

One of the themes in Miko Kings is the importance of how history is recorded, framed, and told. When Lena first discovers the leather pouch in the wall of the house she’s inherited, the photograph of the Miko Kings team is the item that stands out to her the most. It simultaneously provides no initial context for the painful history that Lena knows the men faced while also giving her a glimpse into the kind of people these players were. In many ways, the photograph transcends time and initiates Lena’s quest for more information about the Miko Kings.

“But instead of ‘Allahu Akbar,’ I heard ‘The time has come to return home.’”

The importance of land and place in defining identity and community is a prevalent theme in the book, first appearing in Chapter 1 as Lena recalls her time in the Middle East. Lena never imagined herself returning to Oklahoma, but after suffering the loss of her partner, Sayyed, she felt lost. She had a moment of clarity during the Salaat, an Arabic chant. It is then that she heard the call, which ultimately brought her back to her ancestral home.

“The laws of physics do not distinguish between past and present. Neither does the Choctaw language, at least not in the way that English does.”

When Ezol first starts to visit Lena, she tells her the theories she has about time and space. The book, much like Ezol’s theories, weave time and space together, holding room for past and present to co-exist and affect one another. This is the first time these theories are discussed, and they will continue to be important as the book progresses. Later in the book, the theories are tied directly to the game of baseball.

“The teachers discourage personal beliefs, rituals, and traditions […] Everyone is strange, not like his Choctaw relatives at home.”

When Hope is sent to the Hampton Normal School for Blacks and Indians, he finds himself forced to disconnect from his Choctaw heritage. Instead, he is expected to assimilate with white customs, religion, and dress. This experience that Hope has as a young teen foreshadows what he, like other Indigenous people, will have to deal with the rest of his life, specifically when he is on the set of His Last Game.

“It is through stories that people transcend time and enter into the world of immortality.”

For the characters in Miko Kings, this quote takes on a literal meaning. The spirit of Ezol visits Lena, blending space and time to help her descendent write the history of the Miko Kings baseball team. In 1969, Hope keeps the memory of his beloved Justina alive by revisiting the past through the telling of stories. The quote also operates metaphorically and supports the theme of The Importance of Preserving an Accurate History.

“[Blip] told Hope that he must have inherited tikba, a power, from the original ball players who play nightly among the stars. Blip said he knows enough to stay out of the way of such powers—and that Hope better use them wisely.”

The reverence with which Hope’s athletic abilities are treated directly supports the theme of The Intersection of Baseball and Indigenous Identity. While white Americans enjoy playing and watching baseball as a fairly new pastime, the Choctaws have centuries of traditions and rituals surrounding the game.

“So how does an ordinary woman become a heroine, even a legend, among blacks in Old New Orleans? After such an early public, activist life, why did she retreat to live anonymously among common citizens?”

When Algernon first visits Justina, he is drawn by her quick ascension to fame and her even quicker retreat into obscurity. He senses that there is more to the story than history has reported so far, and he is determined to hear Justina’s side of the story.

“But Madame, how can we know the truth of your story if you will not speak it? You accuse historians like me of inventing your life. Only you can tell it.”

Justina is hesitant at first to speak more candidly about her past. Evangeline, her great-granddaughter, is determined to preserve Justina’s legacy and invites Algernon into their home for an interview. The theme of recording an accurate history emphasizes the fact that the person who tells the story is as important as—if not more important than—the story itself. If history is to be passed down accurately, it can’t be told solely from a white, colonizer lens.

“Only the scars we carry remain. That’s the problem when rage is unleashed. Nothing is solved. We thought we could bring liberation from suffering, but in truth we only brought destruction.”

Justina regrets some of her early-career social justice work, which was rooted in violence. This quote also holds weight for the story of her long-lost love: Hope Little Leader. The text later reveals that Hope’s hands were cut off after he threw the last game of the Miko Kings. The violence enacted upon Hope did not bring positive change but instead only caused more pain.

“Then he realizes what’s missing from his baseball team. Heart. He needs someone like Malihoma. A ballplayer who’s all heart could lead by example.”

Henri Day is inspired by Malihoma when he is first putting together the Miko Kings baseball team. If Henri is to build a team that gains national recognition, he will need more than pure skill. Malihoma’s heart also makes him a great team player and a leader that the others admire and respect.

“A league of all Indian baseball teams will demonstrate that the people from different tribes can own something together.”

The founding of the Miko Kings is first and foremost a way for the Indigenous people to reclaim a sense of agency in the wake of colonization and violence. By forming an Indigenous baseball team, they will be reclaiming some of their ancient traditions that they have been forced to forego.

“It seems that Indians in the southeast had been organizing intertribally to play ball long before the Europeans ever arrived.”

Although white Americans try to claim the invention of baseball, the southeastern Indigenous Americans have actually been playing it for years. Filming His Last Game may not convince white American audiences that baseball is an Indigenous game, but it will at least help the Miko Kings gain recognition for their contribution to, and excellence in, the sport. 

“Light is the key to time, I said to Blip. Choctaw words are tools for moving back and forth in time. Our verbs are directional—in or out, dull and bright. To ‘ball up’ is a verb.”

Ezol has many theories about the connection between the Choctaw language and how it more accurately reflects the rules of space and time than English. This is first seen when the spirit of Ezol appears to Lena in 2006, but journal entries (including this quotation) demonstrate Ezol’s depth of knowledge on the topic and her dedication to investigating it further.

“Justina corrects my pitiable French, and she listens as I talk of my experiments with time.”

One of the most significant relationships that unfolds in Miko Kings is the friendship between Ezol and Justina. Justina’s comforting nature and kind heart are a different, perhaps more accurate legacy than the songs that are written about her time as “Black Juice,” the social activist. Now that Lena has access to the journal, she can share this version of Justina with future readers of her book about the Miko Kings.

“[Henri Day] wanted Indians from the five civilized tribes to begin investing in themselves. To hold something in common, even if it was just baseball.”

This quote reveals more about Henri Day’s true motivation for investing in the Miko Kings. For him, it was never just about forming a team. It might start with baseball, but the bigger picture he is fighting for is a unity between the Indigenous tribes that is much needed after centuries of persecution and colonization. For Henri, this is worth investing every cent of his money.

“Seventh Calvary won that game 4-1 […] With one pitch, one swing of the bat, you got four runs. One plus one equals four.”

One of Ezol’s equations that she consistently quotes is 1+1=4. When the time comes for Hope either to play to win the game against the Seventh Calvary or to throw the game, Hope hears Ezol shouting that equation out to Blip. With a stroke of irony, Hope throws the game, and the Seventh Calvary scores four runs. One pitch, one swing, and four runs seems to prove Ezol’s equation true.

“The red man […] will be celebrated like no other hero in moving pictures. Son, it will be your image that will be remembered as the heroic face of American baseball.”

Toward the end of the book, the text reveals what was said to Hope to make him get off the horse on the day he almost rode away from set. He recalls this memory toward the end of his life, when he is visited by the spirit of a warrior and a turquoise horse. He remembers how his ambition to be the best baseball player ever caused a lapse in judgment; had Laemmle not tugged at Hope’s pride, he would not have returned to the film set.

“Perhaps, although she deeply regretted many of her own actions. But that is how we often see ourselves in our later years, through recurring interludes of regret.”

The book Miko Kings is ultimately a story about the framing of history, both on the macro and the micro level. Many characters are haunted by the past and have regrets, but they learn through the telling of stories that pain and regret can start to be healed. It is only when the stories remain unspoken that the emotional wounds continue to fester.

“Often a clear memory is torture. Remembering the past can be its own special kind of suffering.”

When Lena discovers that Cora had guilt of her own surrounding the story of the Miko Kings, she begins to see pieces of the past more clearly. Cora often told Lena that she was being punished, and now Lena wonders if the memories of her betrayal to Ezol, and even her potential involvement with the fire that killed Ezol, is its own form of punishment. While some memories can bring peace, reliving these moments would have felt like punishment to Cora.

“Silently Blip and Albert tie his wrists to keep him from bleeding to death, their purpose not to kill but to disable.”

Near the end of the book, the text finally reveals the way that Hope lost his hands. After he discovers that his own people disapprove of his relationship with Justina because of her race, he makes up his mind to throw the game. This enrages Blip Bleen, who doesn’t know Hope’s reasoning behind the game and thinks that he ended up siding with Hash and the gamblers. This betrayal is what leads him and a few others to cut off Hope’s hands with an ax.

“And the roar of the Indians can be heard all the way back to Fort Sill, where, after twenty-two years, Geronimo, honored leader of the Apaches, is still a prisoner of war.”

The text gives a stark reminder that, for the small victories the Miko Kings experience in the game of baseball, there are still countless Indigenous Americans who are being persecuted, imprisoned, and killed. This particular quotation takes on two levels of dramatic irony. First, it takes place during the filming of His Last Game, where Hope pitches a winning throw, contrasting with his real last game, where he purposely lets the opponents score. Second, there is irony in a film being made by white Americans about a Choctaw baseball team while shooting on a location where a respectable leader like Geromino is spending years as a prisoner of war.

“The enigma enters the room where we have recreated the past—telling the story of not just her relatives, but mine too.”

Lena began the book feeling alone and abandoned and struggled to connect with her Native heritage. After meeting Ezol and reading about the story of the Miko Kings, she realizes that she has played a part in piecing together her family history. While at first, she assumed that Ezol might have been a family friend, she learns that the two of them are actually related by blood. Now, Lena feels more connected to not only her heritage but also her family’s personal history.

“Cora had a grief she couldn’t bury, and you had no one else on your mother’s side to take care of you. Lena, I may not be your blood grandmother- but I should have been. And I have always been with you in spirit. That is the true story I came to tell.”

After years of searching for a home, Lena finds it back in Oklahoma with a visitor from the past. Ezol’s connection with Lena goes beyond reclaiming the historical narrative; it’s also about Lena’s quest to return home to her family. She does not have living family members who are there for her, but Ezol reaches Lena through space and time to tell her that she is, and always has been, loved.