The Essential
Gwendolyn
Brooks
elizabeth alexander editor
A M E R I C A N
THE
POETS
LIBRARY
OF
P R O J E C T
AMERICA
CONTENTS
Introduction
firom A Street in Bronzeville (1945)
from A Street in Bronzeville
kitchenette building
the mother
hunchback girl: she thinks of heaven
a song in the front yard
the ballad of chocolate Mabbie
the preacher: ruminates behind the sermon
Sadie and Maud
when you have forgotten Sunday: the love story
of De Witt Williams on his way to Lincoln
Cemetery
the vacant lot
The Sundays of Satin-Legs Smith
Negro Hero
Ballad of Pearl May Lee
from Gay Chaps at the Bar
gay chaps at the bar
still do I keep my look, my identity . . .
23
my dreams, my works, must wait tili after hell
24
looking
25
mentors
25
the white txoops had their orders but the Negroes
looked like men
26
love note / 1 : surely
26
the progress
27
from Annie Allen (1949)
Notes from the Childhood and the Girlhood
the birth in a narrow room
28
Maxie Allen
29
the parents: people like our marriage
Maxie and Andrew
30
Sunday chicken
30
old relative
31
downtown vaudeville
32
the ballad of late Annie
32
throwing out the flowers
33
"do not be afraid of no"
34
"pygmies are pygmies still, tliough percht on Alps"
35
my own sweet good
33
T h e Anniad
The Anniad
36
Appendix to T h e Anniad
47
from T h e Womanhood
I the children of die poor
49
VI the rites for Cousin \ 1t
VII I love those little booths at Benvenuti's
VIII
Beverly
Hills,
Chicago
52
52
54
XI "One wants a Teller in a time like this"
XV "Men of careful turns, haters of forks in the road"
from The Bean Euters (1960)
Strong
The
Men,
Bean
Riding
Horses
F.aters
56
57
59
60
We Real Cool
60
Old Mary
61
A Bronzeville Motfrer Loiters in Mississippi.
Meanwhile, a Mississippi Mother Burns Bacon
T h e Last Quatrain of the Ballad of Emmett Till
61
68
T h e Chicago Defender Sends a Man to Little Rock
68
T h e Lovers of the Poor
71
T h e Crazy Woman
74
A Lovely Love
73
Bronzeville Woman in a Red Hat
75
Bessie of Bronzeville Visits M a r y and N o r m a n
at a Beach-house in N e w Buffalo
78
T h e Ballad of R u d o l p h Reed
79
T h e Egg Boiler
82
from SelectedPoems (1963)
A Catch of Shy Fish
83
from In the Mecca (1968)
from After Mecca
Boy
Breaking
Medgar
Glass
88
89
Evers
90
Malcolm X
Two Dedications
91
T h e Chicago Picasso
The
The
92
Wall
Blackstone
Rangers
94
T h e Sermon on the Warpland
97
T h e Second Sermon on the Warpland
98
from Riot (1969)
Riot
100
T h e Third Sermon on the Warpland
101
from Family Pictures (1970)
T h e Life of Lincoln West
106
from Young Heroes II
To
Paul Robeson
Don
at
Salaam
112
113
from Beckonings (1975)
The Boy Died in My Alley
Steam Song
Elegy in a Rainbow
from Primer for Blacks (1980)
Primer for Blacks
To Those of My Sisters Who Kept Their Naturais
from The Near-Johannesburg Boy (1986)
The Near-Johannesburg Boy
Shorthand Possible
Infirm
from Children Coming Home (1991)
The Coora Flower
Nineteen Cows in a Slow Line Walking
I Am A Black
Uncle Seagram
Abrupdy
from In Montgomery and Other Poems (2003)
An Old Black Woman, Homeless, and Indistinct
Biographical Note
Note on the Texts
Notes
Index of Titles and First Lines