NEGRO YOUTH SPEAKS
145
I TOO
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes.
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
To-morrow
I'll sit at the table
When company comes
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen"
Then.
Besides, they'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed,—
I, too, am America.
-Langston Hughes.
THE DAY-BREAKERS
We are not come to wage a strife
With swords upon this hill,
It is not wise to waste the life
Against a stubborn will.
Yet would we die as some have done.
Beating a way for the rising sun.
-Arna Bontemps.