For Cm

Cluade, here I am, where your feet have stood Far from the mountain flung across the sea Where the poincianna is aglitter, and wood doves brood On things less tedious than our dark history O poet laureate, if your spirit police Harlem now And see my black face, sweating in her street See my spirit too, bondaged but will not bow Armed with courage I fight each day's defeat Filled with love I fondle fondly her fickle feet, And hear her hiss in the clenching of the teeth. You gave her renaissance pool and palace bright She gives me nothing but anxieties through the night. O Claude, greatest of all the Clarendon's McKay I give nothing, and shall not flinch to see decay.

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Denis Joe

Date: 3/14/2009 12:07:00 PM

There is some lovely sound to this as Stacey says. The theme is a big one and the reader is left in no doubt because it is stated in lines such as: 'O poet laureate, if your spirit police Harlem now - And see my black face, sweating in her street' (interesting use of the singular). the rhyme scheme works very well with this poem and helps in the musicality of it. A great poem to read aloud.