a song in the front yard
I've stayed in the front yard all my life.
I want a peek at the back
Where it's rough and untended and hungry weed grows.
A girl gets sick of a rose.I want to go in the back yard now
And maybe down the alley,
To where the charity children play.
I want a good time today.They do some wonderful things.
They have some wonderful fun.
My mother sneers, but I say it's fine
How they don't have to go in at a quarter to nine.
My mother, she tells me that Johnnie Mae
Will grow up to be a bad woman.
That George'll be taken to Jail soon or late
(On account of last winter he sold our back gate.)But I say it's fine. Honest, I do.
And I'd like to be a bad woman, too,
And wear the brave stockings of night-black lace
And strut down the streets with paint on my face.
'a song in the front yard' is from Gwendolyn Brooks' first book of poems A Street in Bronzeville. Brooks was the Poet Laureate of Illinois from early in my childhood until her death in 2000 at 83. Bronzeville is a Black neighborhood on the near south side of Chicago.
She's always been a favorite of mine.
Poem For A Thursday is a meme created by Jennifer at Holds Upon Happiness.
i like it also: it's simple enough to mean something...
ReplyDeleteYeah, there's no reason why a poem has to be obscure...though sometimes you wonder.
DeleteI love this poem! Makes me want to read even more of her writing. :D
ReplyDeleteI've always known of her, but there's a nice Library of America poets series selection that I return to again and again.
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