I know what the caged bird feels, alas!
When the sun is bright on the upland slopes;
When the wind stirs soft through the springing grass,
And the river flows like a stream of glass;
When
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Paul Laurence Dunbar was an American poet, novelist and playwright whose reputation was based on his verses and short stories written in black dialect. He is known as the first African American writer who tried to live off of his writings. Dunbar was also one of the first black authors to gain national fame and international reputation in the United States.
We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
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Pray why are you so bare, so bare,
Oh, bough of the old oak-tree;
And why, when I go through the shade you throw,
Runs a shudder over me?
My leaves were green as the best, I trow,
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Out in the sky the great dark clouds are massing;
I look far out into the pregnant night,
Where I can hear a solemn booming gun
And catch the gleaming of a random light,
That tells me that the
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Come when the nights are bright with stars Or come when the moon is mellow; Come when the sun his golden bars Drops on the hay-field yellow. Come in the twilight soft and gray, Come in the night ... [+]