April Is National Poetry Month!

April Is National Poetry Month!

She's a poet, an author, a playwright, an essayist, and a revolutionary! A leading figure in "The Black Arts Movement." The Co-founder of one of the oldest and largest African-American publishing presses, "Third World Press." Today I shine the spotlight on Carolyn M. Rodgers.

CAROLYN M. RODGERS
TESTAMENT

Child
in the august of your life
you come barefoot to me
the blisters of events
having worn through to the
soles of your shoes.
it is not the time
this is not the time
there is no such time
to tell you
that some pains ease away
on the ebb & toll of
themselves.
there is no such dream that
cannot fail, nor is hope our
only conquest.
we can stand boldly in burdening places (like earth here)
in our blunderings, our bloomings
our palms flattened upward or pressed,
an unyielding down.