Effie Lee Newsome was a figure of the Harlem Renaissance who mostly wrote children's poem and parables about being young and black in the 1920s. She contributed to The Crisis, the official magazine ... [+]
'Tis a noble gift to be brown, all brown,
To be brown like thrush and lark!
Like the strongest things that make up this earth,
Like the mountains grave and grand,
Even like the very land,
Even like the trunks of trees—
Even oaks, to be like these!
God builds His strength in bronze.To be brown like thrush and lark!
Like the subtle wren so dark!
Nay, the king of beasts wears brown;
Eagles are of this same hue.
I thank God, then, I am brown.
Brown has mighty things to do.