April Is National Poetry Month! 

Plea of The Negro Soldier 

Published in "Springfield Republican," 

Feb. 16, 1907. 

CHARLES FRED WHITE

POET 

America, ungrateful land!
Whose treacherous soil my blood has dyed,
Whose wealth my father's shackled hand
Has hoarded up, who has denied
Me right to live, to vote, to learn,
Whose laws protect me not from wrong,
Who will permit me not to earn
An honest living, who in song
Doth boast a land of freedom, but
Whose flag waves o'er a land of crime,
The makers of whose laws unjust
Themselves are stained with blood and slime
Of murders, lynchings, rape and lies,
And who, while yet the sacred oath
Of office on their vile lips lies,
Will lead a mob of comrades forth
To take some negro, innocent,
Accused perhaps, but never tried,
From custody of government
And burn him, to a pillar tied,
I fear the dawning of thy doom:
I hear the voice of justice cry
From out this wilderness of gloom:
I see the dark clouds in thy sky.
From Boston massacre, my blood
Through all the channels of thy war
Has mingled with thy crimson flood;
Through Yorktown, Erie, Wagner,—far
To El Caney and San Juan Hill,
Where, midst the charges awful din,
With song our voice the air did fill
And make that song a battle hymn.—
The Philippines, so dearly bought,
Are strewn with bodies of my kin;
My comrades have thy glory wrought
In war, in peace, with skill and vim.
'Twas I who rescued from the urn
Of death thy fickle soldier chief;
Tis he who gives me in return
Disgrace, dishonor, no relief
From poverty my feeble years
Must bring me soon; he who deprives
Me of support retirement rears
Up for her faithful soldiers' lives.
My thirty years of living death
In bloody war avail me naught
When prejudice and perjured breath
Of Brownsville 'gainst my name is brought.
And dost thou yet, ungrateful land
Expect my blood and kin to stand
In cowered silence, while thy hand
Continues to despoil our band?
May God forbid that of my race
A single child shall e'er disgrace
His native land, the resting place
Of martyred kin, by fear to face
Injustice by whomever thrown.
The ancient Plebeians of Rome
For treatment such renounced their home
And sought the Sacred Mountain's dome.
The colonies of George the Third
To less injustice war preferred
And fired,—the while the world concurred,—
The shot which round the earth was heard.
Republic cannot long endure
When autocrat can feel secure
To heap injustice on the poor
Or helpless; ruin follows sure.
Three centuries have near rolled by
Since first our fathers' mournful cry
And clank of chains rose to thy sky,
Nor yet have found just cause to die.
Our voice of protest shall not cease
Until thy unjust bonds release
Our rights, that our lives may increase
In riches, happiness and peace.
But I, alas! have given all
In answer to thy urgent call,
Exposed my life to sword and ball,
And now, as o'er me creeps the fall
Of life, I find no recompense
But base discharge, with no defense
Through which to prove my innocence,
Though I've committed no offense.
For this I've given up my home
O'er hapless battle-fields to roam,
I've crossed the ocean's hungry foam,
I've fought disease in hostile loam.
O God of justice and of right!
If thou art deaf and hast no sight,
Lend me Thy weapons and Thy might,
That this last battle I may fight.

 April Is National Poetry Month! 

THE NEGRO'S "AMERICA" appeared in "The Colored Advocate” 

in 1897.

FRANK BARBOUR COFFIN

POET X PHARMCIST

My country, ’tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Would I could sing;
Its land of Pilgrim’s pride
Also where lynched men died
With such upon her tide,
Freedom can’t reign.
My native country, thee
The world pronounce you free
Thy name I love;
But when the lynchers rise
To slaughter human lives
Thou closest up thine eyes,
Thy God’s above.
Let Negroes smell the breeze
So they can sing with ease
Sweet freedom’s song;
Let justice reign supreme,
Let men be what they seem
Break up that lyncher’s screen,
Lay down all wrong.
Our fathers’ God, to Thee,
Author of liberty,
To Thee we sing;
How can our land be bright?
Can lynching be a light?
Protect us by thy might,
Great God our king!

April Is National Poetry Month!  

AMERICA

Published in 1853

JAMES M. WHITFIELD 

POET X ABOLITIONSIT X POLITICAL ACTIVIST

America, it is to thee,

Thou boasted land of liberty,—
It is to thee I raise my song,
Thou land of blood, and crime, and wrong.
It is to thee, my native land,

From whence has issued many a band

To tear the black man from his soil,

And force him here to delve and toil;

Chained on your blood-bemoistened sod,

Cringing beneath a tyrant's rod,

Stripped of those rights which Nature's God

Bequeathed to all the human race,

Bound to a petty tyrant's nod,

Because he wears a paler face.

Was it for this, that freedom's fires

Were kindled by your patriot sires?
Was it for this, they shed their blood,

On hill and plain, on field and flood?

Was it for this, that wealth and life

Were staked upon that desperate strife,

Which drenched this land for seven long years

With blood of men, and women's tears?

When black and white fought side by side, 

Upon the well-contested field,—

Turned back the fierce opposing tide, 

And made the proud invader yield—

When, wounded, side by side they lay, 

And heard with joy the proud hurrah

From their victorious comrades say 

That they had waged successful war,

The thought ne'er entered in their brains

That they endured those toils and pains,

To forge fresh fetters, heavier chains

For their own children, in whose veins

Should flow that patriotic blood,

So freely shed on field and flood.

Oh no; they fought, as they believed, 

For the inherent rights of man;

But mark, how they have been deceived 

By slavery's accursed plan.

They never thought, when thus they shed

Their heart's best blood, in freedom's cause

That their own sons would live in dread, 

Under unjust, oppressive laws:

That those who quietly enjoyed 

The rights for which they fought and fell,

Could be the framers of a code, 

That would disgrace the fiends of hell!

Could they have looked, with prophet's ken, 

Down to the present evil time, 

Seen free-born men, uncharged with crime,

Consigned unto a slaver's pen,—

Or thrust into a prison cell,

With thieves and murderers to dwell—

While that same flag whose stripes and stars

Had been their guide through freedom's wars

As proudly waved above the pen

Of dealers in the souls of men!

Or could the shades of all the dead, 

Who fell beneath that starry flag,

Visit the scenes where they once bled, 

On hill and plain, on vale and crag,

By peaceful brook, or ocean's strand, 

By inland lake, or dark green wood,

Where'er the soil of this wide land 

Was moistened by their patriot blood,—

And then survey the country o'er, 

From north to south, from east to west,

And hear the agonizing cry

Ascending up to God on high,

From western wilds to ocean's shore, 

The fervent prayer of the oppressed;

The cry of helpless infancy 

Torn from the parent's fond caress

By some base tool of tyranny,

And doomed to woe and wretchedness;

The indignant wail of fiery youth, 

Its noble aspirations crushed,

Its generous zeal, its love of truth, 

Trampled by tyrants in the dust;

The aerial piles which fancy reared, 

And hopes too bright to be enjoyed,

Have passed and left his young heart seared, 

And all its dreams of bliss destroyed.

The shriek of virgin purity, 

Doomed to some libertine's embrace,

Should rouse the strongest sympathy 

Of each one of the human race;

And weak old age, oppressed with care, 

As he reviews the scene of strife,

Puts up to God a fervent prayer, 

To close his dark and troubled life.

The cry of fathers, mothers, wives, 

Severed from all their hearts hold dear,

And doomed to spend their wretched lives 

In gloom, and doubt, and hate, and fear;

And manhood, too, with soul of fire,

And arm of strength, and smothered ire,

Stands pondering with brow of gloom,

Upon his dark unhappy doom,

Whether to plunge in battle's strife,

And buy his freedom with his life,

And with stout heart and weapon strong,

Pay back the tyrant wrong for wrong,

Or wait the promised time of God, 

When his Almighty ire shall wake,

And smite the oppressor in his wrath,

And hurl red ruin in his path,

And with the terrors of his rod, 

Cause adamantine hearts to quake.

Here Christian writhes in bondage still, 

Beneath his brother Christian's rod,

And pastors trample down at will, 

The image of the living God.

While prayers go up in lofty strains, 

And pealing hymns ascend to heaven,

The captive, toiling in his chains, 

With tortured limbs and bosom riven,

Raises his fettered hand on high, 

And in the accents of despair,

To him who rules both earth and sky, 

Puts up a sad, a fervent prayer,

To free him from the awful blast 

Of slavery's bitter galling shame—

Although his portion should be cast 

With demons in eternal flame!

Almighty God! Ât is this they call 

The land of liberty and law;

Part of its sons in baser thrall 

Than Babylon or Egypt saw—

Worse scenes of rapine, lust and shame, 

Than Babylonian ever knew,

Are perpetrated in the name 

Of God, the holy, just, and true;

And darker doom than Egypt felt,

May yet repay this nation's guilt.

Almighty God! thy aid impart,

And fire anew each faltering heart,

And strengthen every patriot's hand,

Who aims to save our native land.

We do not come before thy throne, 

With carnal weapons drenched in gore,

Although our blood has freely flown, 

In adding to the tyrant's store.

Father! before thy throne we come, 

Not in the panoply of war,

With pealing trump, and rolling drum, 

And cannon booming loud and far;

Striving in blood to wash out blood,

Through wrong to seek redress for wrong;

For while thou 'rt holy, just and good, 

The battle is not to the strong;

But in the sacred name of peace, 

Of justice, virtue, love and truth,

We pray, and never mean to cease, 

Till weak old age and fiery youth

In freedom's cause their voices raise,

And burst the bonds of every slave;

Till, north and south, and east and west,

The wrongs we bear shall be redressed.

April Is National Poetry Month!

AMERICA

HENRY DUMAS 

POET X WRITER

If an eagle be imprisoned
On the back of a coin
And the coin is tossed into the sky,
That coin will spin,
That coin will flutter,
But the eagle will never fly.

April Is National Poetry Month!

AMERICA

MAYA ANGELOU 

RENOWNED ICONIC POET X AUTHOR X AUTOBIOGRAPHIST X 

ESSAYIST X CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST X SINGER X DANCER

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MAYA ANGELOU!

The gold of her promise

has never been minded

Her borders of justice

not clearly defined

Her crops of abundance

the fruit and the grain

Have not fed the hungry

nor eased that deep pain

Her proud declarations

are leaves on the wind

Her southern exposure

black death did befriend

Discover this country

dead centuries cry

Eract noble tablets

where none can decry

“She kills her bright future

and rapes for a sou

Then entraps her children

with legends untrue”

I beg you

Discover this country.

April Is National Poetry Month!

TO BE BLACK IN AMERICA

APPEARED IN "ROCKS CRY OUT," PUBLISHED BY 

BROADSIDE PRESS.

Attribution: CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT ARCHIVE

NANCY LEVI ARNEZ 

POET X EDUCATOR

To be black in America
Is to be constantly scorned—
To be forever mourned

It's a tearful eye.
It's a gasping sigh.

It's a tearful eye. 

It's a gasping sigh.

To be black in America
Is to be shoved to the side—
To be drowned in the tide;
It's a fist of hate.

It's a bolted gate.

To be black in America
Is to be treated like dirt—
To be forever hurt.
It's a way of life.
It's endless strife.

To be black in America
Is to never be free—
To be cut from a tree.
It's a sea of woe.
It's a swift death blow.

Read more about Civil Rights History and Poems @ CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT ARCHIVE

 April Is National Poetry Month!

GOD BLAME AMERICA!!

"GOD BLAME AMERICA," APPEARS IN A "BLACK MANIFESTO IN 

JAZZ POETRY AND PROSE."

TED JOANS

POET X PAINTER X FILMMAKER X JAZZ TRUMPETER

GOD BLAME AMERICA!!

America/Miss America is over paid, over fed, over stuffed and now over here!

America/poets dont fasten their flies no more

America/ shoes can not be worn out on fingers

America/Germany is just as strong as America under arms

America/Mickey the Mouse is colored

America/whiskey contains cigarette cancer

America/I lick stamps on the wrong side

America/ nine to five aint forever, is it?

America/your fliptop box is showing

America/your women sound like sex starved Donald Ducks

America/the electric chair is too comfortable for your officials

America/I do not want to be integrated into you

America/I continue eating watermelons on TV for a fee

America/Why do I scare thee when I attempt to live free?

America/hot dogs cant be hamburgers much longer

America/Jazz has won the youth of the world

America/rhinoceroses are lonely in the zoos

America/the ghosts of Indians haunt your family nightly?

America/many of them aint really ready, are they?

America/Kosher cats closed my contract to you

America/ screaming is still valid

America/I do believe you're afraid

America/Munchen maids dance black

America/I sing Round Bout Midnight

America/Your eyes are nervous

America/your handshake's a fake

America/your mask has slipped America/your whites arent hip

America/their blues aint sad

America/your image is bad

America/surrender to the East! Forget the West! Go it

alone, that's best!

America can you hear me? America, did you hear what

I said? America??

(a voice) FUCK YOU!

America/MAY I?