TO SAMUEL COLERIDGE TAYLOR, UPON HEARING HIS
Strange to a sensing motherhood,
Loved as a toy--not understood,
Child of a dusky father, bold;
Frail little captive, exiled, cold.
Oft when the brooding planets sleep,
You through their drowsy empires creep,
Flinging your arms through their empty space,
Seeking the breast of an unknown face.
-Georgia Douglas Johnson.
THE ORDEAL
Ho! my brother,
Pass me not by so scornfully
I'm doing this living of being black,
Perhaps I bear your own life-pack,
And heavy, heavy is the load
That bends my body to the road.
But I have kept a smile for fate,
I neither cry, nor cringe, nor hate,
Intrepidly, I strive to bear
This handicap. The planets wear
The Maker's imprint, and with mine
I swing into their rhythmic line;
I ask-only for destiny,
Mine, not thine.
-Georgia Douglas Johnson.
