Pour O pour that parting soul in song, O pour it in the sawdust glow of night. Into the velvet pine-smoke air to-night.
And let the valley carry it along.
Ethel Waters sleeps in the stable
Looking up at the moon and the stars-
It’s a bright night in Lexington, Kentucky,-
But the Colored Folks in town will not
Rent a room to a girl who’s in
A carnival for entertainment tonight.
-And so Ethel is looking way-up again,
there by the side of the Milky Way,
she sings the St. Louis Blues for Jim…..
The night John Henry is born
an ax of lightning splits the sky,
and a hammer of thunder pounds the earth,
and the eagles and panthers cry!
John Henry-he says to his Ma and Pa:
“Get a gallon of barleycorn.
I want to start right, like a he-man child,
the night that I am born!”
Says: “I want some ham hocks, ribs, and jowls,
a pot of cabbage and greens;
some hoecakes, jam, and buttermilk,
a platter of pork and beans!”
John Henry’s Ma-she wrings her hands,
and his Pa-he scratches his head.
I done told you babe, I didn’t tell you no lie
I want some of your custard pie. You gotta gimme some of it.
You gotta gimme some of it.
Well, I want some of it before you give it all away.
Well I don’t care if your gonna cross the street.
When you cut your pie, please save me a piece.
I’ve gotta have some of it. I’ve gotta have some of it.
Well, I want some of it before you give it all away.
I done told you babe, it’s understood, you’ve got the best pie in the neighborhood. I’ve gotta have some of it.
Well, I want some of it. I’ve gotta have some of it.
I’ve spent the last 10 years
In other people’s offices
Learning the alphabet of nods and eyebrows
And pursed lips, straining for the purse
Legs crossed in easy confidence
Confident nervous gestures of assurance
Approved blue suits
And sudden dreamed-up lies to be delivered
A net of thirty days and sixty days and ninety
Insanely stretched past promise into years
Next week, for certain
Floated haphazardly on possibles
As slight as handshakes
Firm as agreements of subjective verbs
And got nowhere.
This happy corner, sucking up hard-boiled eggs
And polish hots
The seidel s
The Harlem Advocate fell between his legs.
The story was incredible!
Taking off his glasses,
Uncle Rufus rubbed the lenses and thought…though.
Yes, his son had always been a prodigal son,
Drinking home brew and chasing sin-loving women
And staying away from church at revival times.
Then he had gone to Selma, Alabama,
With that Blackwood woman
Who had lived with a dozen different sweet men.
The Harlem Advocate said
Eddie had cut up the Blackwood woman in a dance hall;
And when the jury had found him guilty
He’d struck a prosecuting attorney in the jaw;
And it h
The sky, lazily disdaining to pursue
The setting sun, too indolent to hold
A lengthened tournament for flashing gold,
Passively darkens for night’s barbeque,
A feast of moon and men and barking hounds.
A orgy for some genius of the south
White blood-hot eyes and cane-lipped scented mouth,
Surprised with making folk-songs from soul sounds.
The sawmill blows its whistle buzz-saws stop,
And silence breaks the bud of knoll and hill,
Soft settling pollen where plowed lands fulfill
The early promise of a bumper crop.
Smoke from the pyramid sawdust pile
Curls up, blue ghost of tre
O Africa, know thou not my call?
Know thy rivers not my love?
Claim thy mountains not my heart?
O Africa! Homeland of my own!
I come with my heart afire;
I come with a soul in search of light!
O Africa! Hear a voice in search of hope,
Welcome home a brother lost;
Receive a heart of melody.
O Africa! Knows thou not my plight?
For all sight, I seek a light in thee!
O Africa! My Africa! Know thou not my flight?
Reclaim my heart and soul on sight!!!
