Sanity was dressed in filth
And nobody recognized her.
The long days and warm nights
Sped along, chased one another,
And were lost in time.
And time,
Men, and something within us
Conspired against us and our innocence.
The gloom of the land rushed on to meet us.
Suddenly four white lads were about us.
"I'll have these ones,
" a cucumber-headed lad said.
"What's the matter?" We asked.
"You're going to fight us," he said.
"We fight fair," another said.
"We don't want to fight,"
We said.
"You'll fight!" said cucumber -head.
Why?"
"We want to kill you!"
"What have we done,"
We cried
"You're black," the third lad said.
"Ready!
"For this much all men know:
Despite compromise,
War, struggle, the Negro is not free”.
The Negro is not free
For we sow while others reap
The golden increment of bursting fruit,
Not always countenance, abject and mute,
The receipts of our forced labors cheap;
Not everlastingly while others sleep
Shall we delight their limbs with mellow flute,
Not always bend to some more subtle brute;
We were not made eternally to weep?
For a wise man once said :
‘The black man only exist
In this world,
Without truly Living ’.
