Edward S. Silvera, "Jungle Taste" (1926)
There is a coarseness
In the songs of black men
Of the sea.
There is a weird strangeness
In the songs of black men
Which sounds not strange
To me.
There is beauty
In the faces of black women,
Jungle beauty
And mystery.
Dark, hidden beauty
In the faces of black women
Which only black men
See.
Finality
Trees are the souls of men
Reaching skyward.
And while each soul
Draws nearer God
Its dark roots cleave
To earthly sod :
Death, only death
Brings triumph to the soul.
The silent grave alone
Can bare the goal.
Then roots and all
Must lie forgot
To rot.
EDWARD SILVERA.
Published in Fire!! Devoted to the Younger Negro Artists, November 1926
An excerpt was also published in The Crisis, January 1927