Clouds and Sunshine

Sarah Lee Brown Fleming

Description

Clouds and Sunshine (1920) is a collection of poems by Sarah Lee Brown Fleming. Published during the Harlem Renaissance, Clouds and Sunshine is a powerful work of poetry exploring themes of faith, racial identity, loss, and love in twentieth century America. Recognized as a leading advocate for the advancement of Black girls and women throughout her life, Fleming is a writer whose voice never falters from the task at hand: telling the story of her people. Separated into three sections, Clouds and Sunshine shows Flemings prowess as a lyric poet of the Romantic persuasion, a dialect poet in the tradition of Paul Laurence Dunbar, and a groundbreaking political writer who observed the experiences of Black Americans while recording and examining her own. In “Tuskegee,” she offers an ode to the iconic institution founded by Booker T. Washington in Alabama: “On thy consecrated ground / Is carved a wondrous story, / Out of chaos, Washington / Raised this place to glory.” In “The Black Man’s Hope,” located in the section titled “Race Poems,” Fleming condemns the politics of the United States, which promises so much to white Americans while betraying time and again a people it never meant to recognize as citizens: “I hear the talk of the white man’s hope / In the ring and at the poll, / But never a word of the black man’s hope / Do I hear as time doth roll. // Bowed with the weight which slavery left / Upon his chattled frame, / No star of hope comes into view / The weight is still the same.” In two brief stanzas, Fleming effectively condemns the emptiness offered with every election cycle. Far from despairing, she makes a powerful case for resistance while telling a terrible truth: prejudice is a manmade thing, and only targeted action can undo it. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Sara Lee Brown Fleming’s Clouds and Sunshine is a classic work of African American literature reimagined for modern readers.

Sujets

• African American
• Poetry
• American
• Black

Informations

• Publié par: Mint Editions
• Date de parution: 28 mai 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781513288109
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Clouds and Sunshine
Sarah Lee Brown Fleming
 
Clouds and Sunshine was first published in 1920.
This edition published by Mint Editions 2021.
ISBN 9781513283081 | E-ISBN 9781513288109
Published by Mint Editions ®

minteditionbooks .com
Publishing Director: Jennifer Newens
Design & Production: Rachel Lopez Metzger
Project Manager: Micaela Clark
Typesetting: Westchester Publishing Services
 
THIS LITTLE BOOK
I AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATE
TO MY CHILDREN,
DOROTHY AND HAROLD
 
C ONTENTS D OROTHEA T USKEGEE D EATH W HEN L OVE S LEEPETH C OME L ET U S B E F RIENDS M AN ’ S I NCONSTANCY C OMFORT T HE S PIRIT OF A F RIEND M Y F ORTUNE T HE W ITCH P AL , L ET ’ S B E T RUE A N IBBLING M OUSE B OY A T S CHOOL IN E NGLAND W HAT I S I T ? D IALECT P OEMS M AMMY D E T ANGO L ESSON B ACK -S LIDING L IZA T HE L ONESOME M AN R ACE P OEMS T HE B LACK M AN ’ S P LEA E MANCIPATION C ELEBRATION R ADIANT W OMAN T HE D YING N EGRO T HE B LACK M AN ’ S H OPE A N E XHORTATION P ICTURES N IGHT S ONG P UT A WAY T HAT U KELELE AND B RING O UT THE O LD B ANJO
 
D OROTHEA
The stars in Heaven now shine with a fuller, gladder light,
My days no longer seem a long and dreary night;
Since thou dost love me dear, all things seem more than bright,
Dorothea, Dorothea, my own Dorothea.
If griefs and sorrows come, they do not pierce so deep,
If tears bedim my eyes they are the bitter-sweet,
If death doth part us here, I know somewhere we’ll meet,
Dorothea, Dorothea, my own Dorothea.
And e’en though death does come, I’ll always see thy face,
Thy hand within my own I ever will embrace,
Remembrance of thee in my soul will have a place.
Dorothea, Dorothea, my own Dorothea.
 
T USKEGEE
Sacred spot on which thou art,
O school of industry.
Thou art doing well thy part
To aid humanity.
On thy consecrated ground
Is carved a wondrous story,
Out of chaos, Washington
Raised this place to glory.
The world has made a beaten track
Unto thy very door,—
A fountain on the desert sands
Thou art for evermore.
 
D EATH
The spirit out of it hath flown,
And left the body all alone,
So after all, what is this clay,
Which we so cherish, can you say?
Look on this form now still in death,
The force is gone which we call breath;
The faculties, yes, every one,
Have stopped their use, with spirit gone.
O death, thou art so grim and drear,
What awful silence thou doth wear.
And thou must visit ev’ry one,—
Yes, every being ’neath the sun.
O, death, thou art a woeful state,
All mankind well doth thee berate,—
Because we know not what awaits
Beyond thy grey, mysterious gates.
Ah death, if I could truly say,