I Shall Return
I shall return again; I shall return To laugh and love and watch with wonder-eyes At golden noon the forest fires burn, Wafting their blue-black smoke to sapphire skies. I shall return to loiter
In Bondage
I would be wandering in distant fields Where man, and bird, and beast, lives leisurely, And the old earth is kind, and ever yields Her goodly gifts to all her children free; Where life
O Word I Love to Sing
O word I love to sing! thou art too tender For all the passions agitating me; For all my bitterness thou art too tender, I cannot pour my red soul into thee. O haunting
To a Poet
There is a lovely noise about your name, Above the shoutings of the city clear, More than a moment’s merriment, whose claim Will greater grow with every mellowed year. The people will not bear
The Castaways
The vivid grass with visible delight Springing triumphant from the pregnant earth, The butterflies, and sparrows in brief flight Chirping and dancing for the season’s birth, The dandelions and rare daffodils That touch the
Through Agony
I All night, through the eternity of night, Pain was my potion though I could not feel. Deep in my humbled heart you ground your heel, Till I was reft of even my inner
Courage
O lonely heart so timid of approach, Like the shy tropic flower that shuts its lips To the faint touch of tender finger tips: What is your word? What question would you broach? Your
Harlem Shadows
I hear the halting footsteps of a lass In Negro Harlem when the night lets fall Its veil. I see the shapes of girls who pass To bend and barter at desire’s call. Ah,
Rest in Peace
No more for you the city’s thorny ways, The ugly corners of the Negro belt; The miseries and pains of these harsh days By you will never, never again be felt. No more, if
Exhortation: Summer 1919
Through the pregnant universe rumbles life’s terrific thunder, And Earth’s bowels quake with terror; strange and terrible storms break, Lightning-torches flame the heavens, kindling souls of men, thereunder: Africa! long ages sleeping, O my
America
Although she feeds me bread of bitterness, And sinks into my throat her tiger’s tooth, Stealing my breath of life, I will confess I love this cultured hell that tests my youth! Her vigor
Baptism
Into the furnace let me go alone; Stay you without in terror of the heat. I will go naked in for thus ”tis sweet Into the weird depths of the hottest zone. I will
The Harlem Dancer
Applauding youths laughed with young prostitutes And watched her perfect, half-clothed body sway; Her voice was like the sound of blended flutes Blown by black players upon a picnic day. She sang and danced
To Winter
Stay, season of calm love and soulful snows! There is a subtle sweetness in the sun, The ripples on the stream’s breast gaily run, The wind more boisterously by me blows, And each succeeding
Futility
Oh, I have tried to laugh the pain away, Let new flames brush my love-springs like a feather. But the old fever seizes me to-day, As sickness grips a soul in wretched weather. I