Beginning with Phillis Wheatley’s Poems on Various Subjects in 1773, African American poetry has a long and powerful history. It is linked to an extensive tradition of oral storytelling and music. Much African American verse is inspired by cultural shifts and historical events happening contemporaneously, specifically from a Black perspective.
This sub-section of Black literature is filled with allusions to the fight for equal rights, slavery and the Civil War, family, history, passion and creation, Harlem, jazz, beauty, and much more. Experiences in contemporary American society flow through African American verse in a unique and highly relevant way. Many authors responded to their environment by bringing to light the darker parts of their experiences, reminding readers that there is never just one way of interpreting events.
Famous African American poets include Langston Hughes, Lucille Clifton, Gwendolyn Brooks, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Nikki Giovanni, and Claude McKay. These authors, and many more, used poetry to define their life experiences and those of their friends, family members, and the broader community. Much of their verse focuses on Black culture, Black love, and the equal treatment of all people in the United States.
’The Negro Speaks of Rivers’ is about a man who has seen the great ages of the world alongside the banks of the most important rivers.
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
‘Still I Rise’ is an inspiring and emotional poem that’s based around Maya Angelou’s experiences as a Black woman in America. It encourages readers to love themselves fully and persevere in the face of every hardship.
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
‘Power’ is based on a real-life murder and court case. This poem was first published in 1978 but is just as relevant today as it was then.
The difference between poetry and rhetoric
is being ready to kill
yourself
instead of your children.
‘Harlem (A Dream Deferred)’ by Langston Hughes is a powerful poem. The poet wrote it in response to what he felt as a black man navigating a career and personal life in a white-dominated world.
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
‘Phenomenal Woman’ by Maya Angelou defies the stereotypes women are often faced with today. It is a poem filled with strength and determination.
Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
‘Primer For Blacks’ by Gwendolyn Brooks speaks on the necessity of accepting one’s black heritage and a possible unified future for all black people.
Blackness
is a title,
is a preoccupation,
is a commitment Blacks
Dunbar was inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, as it was one of the first works of literature to shed light on the brutality and cruelty of slavery.
She told the story, and the whole world wept
At wrongs and cruelties it had not known
But for this fearless woman's voice alone.
She spoke to consciences that long had slept:
‘The Women Gather’ is a short, free verse poem that speaks on how we judge one another and the essentially good nature of human beings.
The women gather because it is not unusual to seek comfort in our hours of stress.
A man must be buried.
It is not unusual that the old bury the young though it is an abomination.
Ballad of Birmingham’ by Dudley Randall is a moving narrative of the last moments of a little girl murdered in a church bombing.
“Mother dear, may I go downtown
Instead of out to play,
And march the streets of Birmingham
In a Freedom March today?”
‘Poem About My Rights’ by June Jordan is a one-stanza poem revealing a speaker’s thoughts on misogyny, sexism, and racism from their experience. It is celebrated for accurately portraying the struggles of women and men of color in a patriarchial and predominantly white society.
‘The Quilting’ by Paul Laurence Dunbar is a very short love poem that reveals the speaker’s growing affection for a woman named Dolly.
‘The Rose That Grew From Concrete’ is a moving celebration of personal resolve against the backdrop of oppressive forces.
‘Star-Fix’ by Marilyn Nelson is a poem that lionizes the noble role of the navigator onboard an aircraft.
‘Claudette Colvin Goes to Work’ by Rita Dove depicts the life and struggles of Claudette Colvin, who is best known as a civil rights activist.
Derek Walcott’s ‘Ruins of a Great House’ combines themes of historical and cultural abuse with factual reasoning and literary references to bring together a massive emotional conflict in the Speaker’s perception.
‘Caged Bird’, or ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings’ as the poem is sometimes referred to, by Maya Angelou, is arguably one of the most moving and eye-opening poems ever written.
‘For Sidney Bechet’ is a poetic tribute to Sidney Bechet, one of the early jazz maestros that poet Philip Larkin admired the most.
‘Frederick Douglass’ by Robert Hayden honors Douglass and speaks about a future in which all people, according to Douglass’ ideas of love and logic, will be treated equally without question.
‘Hard Rock Returns to Prison’ is an allegory of oppression and forced submission of Black inmates in America.
Langston Hughes’ poem ‘I, Too, Sing America’ is an incredibly personal poem Hughes wrote, highlighting American Society and a Black man’s experience in it.
‘Rosa Parks’ by Nikki Giovanni is a poem about activism and the importance of remembering important moments in African American history. The poem pays tribute to the heroic actions of the Pullman Porters who spearheaded the civil rights movement and forever changed history for the African American community.
‘Save Our Sons’ focuses on the struggle the African men of England have faced and continue to face against racism and violence.