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The darkness and the burden of chains
Over the field
Through the pause of time
it carried the sung our fathers sang
And the comely word of mother tongue
In which I learned to hope;
Sound full of toil and drudgery
yet rich strong and soaring
Untie our knuckles from all the hackles
that hold my shackled voices
yet captives require of us a song
Of the selves beyond our reach
For the old has lost it lure
among our race in bondage
deep rooted like the oak
from the hassles of the mind
let freedom ring
in a song of unity
though we have worked this route
with our blood for five score years
The sound of each nuances
and the message they send
of the old Negro
spiritual,
"Free at last!
free at last!
thank God Almighty,
we are free at last!"
may we be truly free
Hear the forest hum
Listen to the tune
Across the field of cotton patch
You can hear the chink of chains
As the timber comes crashing down
Clanking out all the wrong
Trying to burst my seam
Against the snarling drill
all that I remembered
happened to me here
as I browse the net
it spring to my line of sight
carrying me home again
the slave of my own poems
you felt as they did
they felt as you did
they are sure of it
they thought they understand
the humiliation of a pure=blooded
african
who lives against his will
they thought they understand
they real thought they do
they understand the whole
teetertotter
of they color line
they believe they understand
the restaint you must feel
they even insist on indentifying
themselves with you
they called themselves NIGGER
and uses every nigger slang
yet with the well known
quintessence of white folks talk
to embrace the color line
The summer heat of the day
Not for me-
The filthy gnat mad field
Not for me-
The bone cracking labors of wood
Not for me-
The toil of shelling corn
Not for me-
Romping deep in decaying slims
Not for me-
The work of the mill
Not for me-
The weight of grains
Not for me-
The sweat and stink of the field
Not for me-
The cruel hiss of the wipe
Not for me-
The groan of the dying
Not for me-
The roar of the sea
Not for me-
the burden of chains
Not for me-
The farm of grain
Not for me-
The stench of the field
Not for me-
The yelling note of the overseer
Not for me-
And I began to think of them `nigga'
Folks once toiling
were now we are playing
Sold off assigned devised
The constant taunt
The mercenary sense of the words,
Arrest the mind
and from its scene
i imagined them
And I suddenly realise how little
I knew about `slaves'
Though I too am black
What I do knew
Not much I presume
when I think
how much there is to know
The bibles says Joseph was sold
For some penny worth
to the "Ishmaelite" I presume
I wonder about them
And the companions of overseers
and think within me,
if I too am a `slave'