I come from a musical place
Where they shoot me for my song
And my brother has been tortured
By my brother in my land.
I come from a beautiful place
Where they hate my shade of skin
They don't like the way I pray
And they ban free poetry.
......
And when, in the city in which I love you,
even my most excellent song goes unanswered,
andI mount the scabbed streets,
the long shouts of avenues,
and tunnel sunken night in search of you...
That I negotiate fog, bituminous
rain rining like teeth into the beggar's tin,
or two men jackaling a third in some alley
weirdly lit by a couch on fire, that I
......
I am back from up the country -- very sorry that I went --
Seeking for the Southern poets' land whereon to pitch my tent;
I have lost a lot of idols, which were broken on the track --
Burnt a lot of fancy verses, and I'm glad that I am back.
Further out may be the pleasant scenes of which our poets boast,
But I think the country's rather more inviting round the coast --
Anyway, I'll stay at present at a boarding-house in town
Drinking beer and lemon-squashes, taking baths and cooling down.
Sunny plains! Great Scot! -- those burning wastes of barren soil and sand
......
ON the Sabbath-day,
Through the churchyard old and gray,
Over the crisp and yellow leaves I held my rustling way;
And amid the words of mercy, falling on my soul like balms,
'Mid the gorgeous storms of music--in the mellow organ-calms,
'Mid the upward-streaming prayers, and the rich and solemn psalms,
I stood careless, Barbara.
My heart was otherwhere,
While the organ shook the air,
......
There is a dark cloud over my head
With every move i make, every step i take
It keeps following me
Lord you know i want to free
Dark clouds, dark clouds, dark clouds
Now as the rain begins to fall, i feel so small
I'm always getting wet with the rain of prejudice
Look there is a mist of discrimation
And the fog of injustice
Dark clouds, dark clouds, dark clouds hanging over my head
......
Rain, rain is falling down all around me,
But my belly is full of laughter,
And I am enjoying the solitude of the evening walk I am on.
Rain, rain is falling down all around me,
And I am happy as can be,
Living in the moment and enjoying the weather.
Rain, rain is falling down all around me,
Watering the plants, watering the vegetables, watering the ground,
......
The sky is overcast with cloud-
The sun knows not where his pride lays;
A stolid day among untiring days.
Continuous thunders, or sounds, loud-
Make the day untrim
Dark and dim.
The Earth looks gloomy under veil
'Tis nothing but fearful symmetry
Can do him deviated from beauty
......
Out the window,
The sky a void of darkness.
Water bashing onto the roof,
Pattering on the ground.
Each drop that hits the glass
Makes a small splash appear,
Melding into another bead.
The sudden rumble.
Then a delayed flash of light;
a streak of purple hitting the horizon.
......
It's raining, there's no umbrella
There are no pot leaves on the balcony
This is the untimely cloud that has descended
There is no joy in anyone's eyes.
There are no flowers in this rain
This rain does not sing the song of rain
The rainy day says I don't know him
I do not know whose daughter this rain!
Yet look at the November rain in the field
......
Thy bless may not come disguise; I believe
Out, on field, thou mesmerize-
Close to mind thou spread beams, before the eve
To such a moon 'tself doth resize
And happier than men
Nothing can appear, when
All subject and property seem spared
Declaring how trust should rescue
In scorching sun, frown of fire, appeared.
......