Preview
Identifier
Kanza1974_048
Object Type
Yearbook
Creation Date
1-1-1974
Description
A 1974 Kanza yearbook page showing three poems about Black pride, including "What is a Black man in America" by Alvin Newman, and two untitled poems by D. A. Kavanagh and Rose M. Ford (continued on page 49).
Transcription
Untitled
Call him different names
in different times.
He is still your brother
in the human race
One look at his face
and you can see
the sin of too many names--
nigger-boy, slave-black--
all the names--
they all come back.
You can see it in his eyes
all those years of lies--
the waste of human life.
Broken and hanging on a tree
so much like Calvary
but where is his Father
and who will set him free?
D. A. Kavanagh
What is a Black man in America?
A Black man is a contemporary slave?
An obedient animal to our naimus massa?
He is freedom’s best friend
and equality’s worst enemy.
He is society’s burden and freedom’s light.
A Black man is a superior being.
Someone with instilled pride, wisdom, diligence.
A passionate and dedicated lover
of his culture, race, and equality.
An annealed glass which seeks to be cracked.
A Black man is a self-learned intellectual.
An intellect on poverty, hate, discrimination, and prejudice
A unique intellect of dreams, equality,
and separation from evil.
An intellectual who is seeking to become a man.
Alvin Newman
Untitled
Who am I?
I am a person...
a person of a proud race,
a proud heritage,
and a proud country.
I am not of the masses; I am of the minority.
A minority which has been beated down
by the whip of racial strife and aggression.
Yet, I rise, with my head uplifted!
proud... Proud... PROUD TO BE BLACK!
Rose M. Ford
