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1
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everything is lost,
everything is crossed with black,
black upon black
and worse than black,
this colourless light.
(Hilda Doolittle (1886-1961), U.S. poet. "Eurydice.")
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Hilda Doolittle
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2
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Standing to America, bringing home
black gold, black ivory, black seed.
(Robert Earl Hayden (1913-1980), U.S. poet. Middle Passage (l. 15-16). . .
Collected Poems [Robert Hayden]. Frederick Glaysher, ed. (1985) Liveright.)
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Robert Earl Hayden
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3
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The myth of black women profiting at the expense of black men is the oldest rap around.
(Johnnetta Betsch Cole (b. 1936), African American educator. As quoted in I Dream a World, by Brian Lanker (1989).
At this time, Cole was the President of Spelman College, a historically African American women's institution.)
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Johnnetta Betsch Cole
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4
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Black one, black one,
there was a white
candle in your heart.
(Denise Levertov (b. 1923), Anglo-U.S. poet. "Olga Poems.")
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Denise Levertov
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5
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Through heavy menace and mystery
Of half-waking tropic dawn,
Behold a little black boy,
A naked black boy,
(Mary Effie Lee Newsome (1885-1979), U.S. poet. Morning Light (l. 5-8). . .
Poetry of Black America, The; Anthology of the 20th Century. Arnold Adoff, ed. (1973) Harper & Row.)
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Mary Effie Lee Newsome
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6
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Black girl black girl
lips as curved as cherries
full as grape bunches
sweet as blackberries
(Dudley Randall (b. 1914), U.S. poet. Blackberry Sweet (l. 1-4). . .
Harper Anthology of Poetry, The. John Frederick Nims, ed. (1981) Harper & Row.)
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Dudley Randall
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7
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The world is not black and white. More like black and grey.
(Graham Greene (1904-1991), British novelist. quoted in Observer (London, Jan. 2, 1983).)
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Graham Greene
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8
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Better have a black face than be worried about black deeds.
(Robert N. Lee, and Rowland V. Lee. Tom Clink (Ernest Cossart), Tower of London, to his young apprentice, who wants to watch an execution (1939).)
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Robert N Lee
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9
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... the black girls didn't get these pills because their black ministers were up on the pulpit saying that birth control pills were black genocide. What I'm saying is that black men have exploited black women.... They didn't want them to have any choice about their reproductive health. And if you can't control your reproduction, you can't control your life.
(Joycelyn Elders (b. 1933), U.S. pediatrician and educator; first woman (and second African American) Surgeon General of the United States. As quoted in the New York Times Magazine, p. 18 (January 30, 1994).
Elders, who was U. S. Surgeon General at the time, was citing one reason white girls were taking birth control pills at a higher rate (and having out-of-wedlock babies at a lower rate) than African American girls.)
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Joycelyn Elders
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10
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This is the black sea-brute bulling through wave-wrack,
(William Stanley Merwin (b. 1927), U.S. poet. Leviathan (l. 1). . .
New Oxford Book of American Verse, The. Richard Ellmann, ed. (1976) Oxford University Press.)
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William Stanley Merwin
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Poets
