African American Poetry: A Digital Anthology

Poems Published in "The Crisis" 1910-1926

The Crisis was a monthly magazine published by the NAACP, which began publication in 1910. Throughout its early years (1910-1934), the magazine was edited by W.E.B. Du Bois, who exerted a strong editorial influence over the magazine's contents. The magazine published poetry, fiction, and even drama throughout its run alongside conventional journalistic articles and opinion. By 1919, The Crisis had a large national subscription base, with as many as 100,000 subscribers, greater than The New Republic. The literature published in the magazine -- including poetry, fiction and drama -- was widely read, and critics have noted that the magazine had an important impact on the literary culture of the Harlem Renaissance that emerged in the early 1920s. Between 1919 and 1926, Jessie Redmon Fauset served as Literary Editor for The Crisis. During that period of time, many young writers who would later be mainstays of the Harlem Renaissance began publishing poetry and criticism in the pages of the magazine, including Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Anne Spencer, as well as Fauset herself. In addition to poetry, the newspaper frequently published criticism and reviews of books of poetry by Black poets. The most influential of these might be William Stanley Braithwaite's 1919 essay, "The Negro in American Literature" (a revised version of that essay was later reprinted in Alain Locke's The New Negro: an Interpretation). 

Between 1910 and 1926, the magazine published more than 250 poems by a wide range of authors. Below, you'll find a fairly complete collection of poems by African American authors who published in the magazine. (It's admittedly a large collection, and in the months to come we hope to find ways to organize it to make it more accessible...)

This page has paths:

  1. African American Poetry: A Story Of Magazines Amardeep Singh

Contents of this tag:

  1. Langston Hughes, "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" (1921)
  2. Langston Hughes, "Proem" ["The Negro"] (1922)
  3. Langston Hughes, "Young Bride" (1925)
  4. Langston Hughes, "Jazzonia" (1923)
  5. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "A Sonnet in Memory of John Brown" (1922
  6. Langston Hughes, "Summer Night" (1925)
  7. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "A Sonnet: to the Mantled" (1917)
  8. Langston Hughes, "Mother to Son" (1922)
  9. James Weldon Johnson, "Brothers" (1916)
  10. Countee Cullen, "Mary, Mother of Christ" (1924)
  11. Benjamin Griffith Brawley, "Shakespeare" (1915)
  12. Langston Hughes, "Song for a Banjo Dance" (1922)
  13. Langston Hughes, "Young Singer" (1923)
  14. W.E.B. Du Bois, "Easter-Emancipation 1863-1913"/ "Children of the Moon" (1913)
  15. Anne Spencer, "Dunbar" (1922)
  16. Langston Hughes, "Aunt Sue's Stories" (1921)
  17. Langston Hughes, "Cross" (1925)
  18. James D. Corrothers, "The Road to the Bow" (1913)
  19. Joseph S. Cotter, Jr., "A Sonnet to the Negro Soldiers" (1918)
  20. Langston Hughes, "To the Black Beloved" (1925)
  21. Langston Hughes, "Negro Dancers" (1925)
  22. Carrie Williams Clifford, "The New Year" (1920)
  23. Langston Hughes, "Disillusion" (1925)
  24. Langston Hughes, "Cabaret" (1923)
  25. Otto Bohanan, "Mammy" (1917)
  26. Arna Bontemps, "Hope" (1924)
  27. Lucian B. Watkins, "Paul Laurence Dunbar--Poet" (1917)
  28. Langston Hughes, "Poem (To F.S.)" (1925)
  29. Leslie Pinckney Hill, "Armageddon" (1915)
  30. Alice Dunbar-Nelson, "Sonnet" (1919)
  31. Countee Cullen, "Bread and Wine" (1923)
  32. Leslie Pinckney Hill, "The Teacher" (1911)
  33. L.A. Proctor, "My Little Love Salome" (1911)
  34. Lucian B. Watkins, "Frederick Douglass-Orator" (1917)
  35. Angelina W. Grimke, "To the Dunbar High School (A Sonnet)" (1917)
  36. Langston Hughes, "Winter Moon" (1923)
  37. Countee Cullen, "Night Rain" (1925)
  38. Leslie Pinckney Hill, "Certainty" (1914)
  39. Countee Cullen, "Three Hundred Years Ago" (1925)
  40. Jessie Fauset, "Oriflamme" (1920)
  41. Jessie Redmon Fauset, "Rondeau" (1912)
  42. Langston Hughes, "Joy" (1926)
  43. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Race Dreams" (1920)
  44. William Pickens, "'The Crisis'" (1914)
  45. Lucian B. Watkins “Song of the American Dove”   (1916)
  46. W.E.B. Du Bois, "Song of the Smoke" (1907)
  47. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Gossamer" (1916)
  48. Cora J. Ball Moten, "A Lullaby" (1914)
  49. Waverly T. Carmichael, "'Taint No Need O' Women Worrin' "(1918)
  50. Katherine Gillard, "Just a Little Tired" (1916)
  51. Clara G. Stillman, "Mysterious Land" (1924)
  52. Lucian B. Watkins, "Ballade to Paul Laurence Dunbar" (1918)
  53. Frank Horne, "My Words" (1926)
  54. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Snow" (1920)
  55. Lillian B. Witten, "Youth Passes" (1920)
  56. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Mate" (1916)
  57. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "My Boy" (1917)
  58. Langston Hughes, "Shadows" (1923)
  59. Countee Cullen, "Thoughts in a Zoo" (1926)
  60. James D. Corrothers, "A Song of May and June" (1914)
  61. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Mocking Bird" (1923)
  62. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Desert-Bound" (1918)
  63. Harriette Shadow Butcher, "The Memory of Colonel Charles Denton Young" (1925)
  64. Alston Burleigh, "The Brave Son" (1919)
  65. Ethel Caution Davis, "A Man" (1916)
  66. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Motherhood" (1922)
  67. Arna Bontemps, "Dirge" (1926)
  68. Profiles of William Stanley Braithwaite in "The Crisis": "Resurrection" (1911)
  69. Effie Lee Newsome (Mary Effie Lee), "Morning Light" (1918)
  70. Charles Bertram Johnson, "An Old Ex-Slave" (1921)
  71. Will N. Johnson, "The Call" (1916)
  72. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "To Your Eyes" (1924)
  73. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Guardianship" (1917)
  74. James D. Corrothers, "Listen, O Isles!" (1914)
  75. Willis Richardson, "The After Thought" (1923)
  76. Fenton Johnson, "War Profiles" (1918)
  77. L. Mattes, "To the Negro" (1925)
  78. Angelina W. Grimke, "To Keep The Memory of Charlotte Forten Grimke" (1915)
  79. Lucian Watkins, "Two Points of View" (1916)
  80. Walter Everett Hawkins, "Child of the Night" (1924)
  81. Arna Bontemps, "Holiday" (1926)
  82. William Stanley Braithwaite, "The Vision" (1911)
  83. Clara Burrill Bruce, "We Who Are Dark" (1918)
  84. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Old Friends" (1921)
  85. Edwin J. Morgan, "Rhapsody" (1917)
  86. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "My Son" (1924)
  87. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Hope" (1917)
  88. William Stanley Braithwaite, "Scintilla" (1915)
  89. Effie Lee Newsome, "Sun Disk" (1923)
  90. Lucian B. Watkins, "Star of Ethiopia" (1918)
  91. Effie Lee Newsome, "Cantabile" (1925)
  92. Arthur Tunnell, "On Segregation" (1914)
  93. Jessie Fauset, "Here's April" (1924)
  94. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Essence" (1916)
  95. Charles Bertram Johnson, "True Wealth" (1924)
  96. Countee Cullen, "Road Song" (1923)
  97. Effie Lee Newsome, "Negro Street Serenade (In the South)" (1926)
  98. Joseph S. Cotter, "To Bishop Hood" (1919)
  99. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Rain-Mist" (1921)
  100. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "The Final Strain" (1917)
  101. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Escape" (1925)
  102. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "The Mother" (1917)
  103. Langston Hughes, "The Last Feast of Belshazzar" (1923)
  104. William Stanley Braithwaite, "Laughing it Out" (1915)
  105. Countee Cullen, "Threnody for a Brown Girl" (1925)
  106. Colonel Charles Young, "A Negro-Mother's Cradle Song" (1923)
  107. Leslie Pinckney Hill, "Father Love" (1919)
  108. Otto Bohanan, "God Gave Us Song" (1918)
  109. Bessie Brent Madison, "Down at the Feet of the Years" (1925)
  110. Jessie Fauset, "Rain Fugue" (1924)
  111. Kelsey Percival Kitchel, "Slave's Song" (1916)
  112. Countee Cullen, "Icarian Wings" (1921/1924)
  113. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Prejudice" (1919)
  114. Langston Hughes, "Ruby Brown" (1926)
  115. B.B. Church, "Maybe" (1923)
  116. Mary J. Washington, "Peace on Earth" (1919)
  117. Bessie Brent Madison, "For Ethiopia" (1921)
  118. Anita Scott Coleman, "The Colorist" (1925)
  119. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Let Me Not Lose My Dream" (1917)
  120. Jasper Ross, "King Cotton and the Negro" (1914)
  121. Gwendolyn B. Bennett, "Quatrain" (1923)
  122. Leslie Pinckney Hill, "In the Still Night" (1917)
  123. Lucian B. Watkins, "The Black Madonna And Her Babe" (1918)
  124. E. Lucien Waithe, "To a Brown Child" (1925)
  125. B.B. Church, "In This Hour" (1919)
  126. Jessie Fauset, "Rondeau" (1912)
  127. Otto Bohanan, "The Washer-Woman" (1916)
  128. Jessie Fauset, "Here's April" (1924)
  129. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Attar" (1920)
  130. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Finality" (1926)
  131. Amedee Brun, "The Pool" (translated by Jessie Fauset, 1921)
  132. Lucian B. Watkins, "Two Poems: War and Peace" (1919)
  133. Effie Lee Newsome (Mary Effie Lee), "Sunset" (1921)
  134. Lucian Watkins, "Samuel Coleridge Taylor--Musician" (1917)
  135. George Reginald Margetson, "The Surge of Life" (1925)
  136. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Shall I Say 'My Son, You Are Branded'?" (1919)
  137. Countee Cullen, "Sweethearts" (1923)
  138. Leslie Pinckney Hill, "Vision of a Lyncher" (1912)
  139. Effie Lee Newsome (Marry Effie Lee), "O Autumn, Autumn!" (1918)
  140. Franke Horne, "Letters Found Near a Suicide" (1925) (Spingarn Prize)
  141. B. Harrison Peyton, "Lo, the Dusk-Born Daughter!" (1916)
  142. Lucian Watkins, "Greatness" (1916)
  143. Langston Hughes, "Song for a Suicide" (1924)
  144. James D. Corrothers, "At the Closed Gate of Justice" (1913)
  145. Langston Hughes, "Monotony" (1923)
  146. Langston Hughes, "To Beauty" (1926)
  147. John Wesley Work (J.W. Work), "It's Great To Be A Problem" (1920)
  148. Effie Lee Newsome, "The Bronze Legacy (To a Brown Boy)" (1922)
  149. Jessie Fauset, "Again It is September" (1917)
  150. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Armageddon" (1925)
  151. Robert W. Justice, "The Heart's Desire" (1911)
  152. Countee Cullen, "If Love be Staunch" (1925)
  153. Jessie Fauset, "Rencontre" (1924)
  154. W.E.B. Du Bois, "In God's Gardens" (1912)
  155. Bertha Johnston, "I Met A Little Blue-Eyed Girl" (1912)
  156. Ida B. Luckie, "Retribution" (1916)
  157. Langston Hughes, "Fascination" (1924)
  158. James D. Corrothers, "In the Matter of Two Men" (1915)
  159. Edward Silvera, "Happiness" and "Death" (1926)
  160. William H.A. Moore “Here in the Time of the Winter Morn” (1912)
  161. Otto Bohanan, "Go, Give the World" (1919)
  162. Paul Laurence Dunbar, "Black Samson of Brandywine"
  163. Arna Bontemps, "Spring Music" (1925)
  164. James Weldon Johnson, "The White Witch" (1915)
  165. Langston Hughes, "Minstrel Man" (1925)
  166. Countee Cullen, "Lament" (1925)
  167. Roasalie M. Jonas, "Crowded Out" (1924)
  168. W.E.B. Du Bois, "Unrest" (1920)
  169. Langston Hughes, "Lullaby" (1926)
  170. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Fame" (1916)
  171. Langston Hughes, "Poem" ("I am waiting for my mother...") (1924)
  172. Langston Hughes, "The Poppy Flower" (1925)
  173. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Decay" (1926)
  174. James Weldon Johnson, "Father, Father Abraham" (1913)
  175. Edwin Garnett Riley, "A Nation's Greatness" (1920)
  176. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Old Things" (1923)
  177. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Heritage" (1917)
  178. James A. Atkins, "The First Wireless Message" (1925)
  179. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Calling Dreams" (1920)
  180. Anne Spencer, "White Things" (1923)
  181. Langston Hughes, "Brothers" (1924)
  182. W.E.B. Du Bois, "Joseph Pulitzer" (1911)
  183. Claude McKay, "A Daughter of the American Revolution to Her Son" (1926)
  184. Carrie Williams Clifford, "Spring" (1915)
  185. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "My Little One" (1916)
  186. Claude McKay, "The Void" (1924)
  187. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Peace" (1916)
  188. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Courier" (1926)
  189. James D. Corrothers, "Up! Sing the Song" (1913)
  190. Joseph S. Cotter, "Whatever Road" (1920)
  191. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Easter" (1923)
  192. James Weldon Johnson, "To America" (1917)
  193. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Companion" (1925)
  194. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Afterglow" (1920)
  195. Langston Hughes, "A Song to a Negro Wash-woman" (1925)
  196. Otto Bohanan, "Paean" (1915)
  197. Yetta Kay Stoddard, "For a Rose" (1922)
  198. Langston Hughes, "My Beloved" (1924)
  199. Josephine T. Washington, "Cedar Hill Saved" (1919)
  200. Countee Cullen, "Dad" (1922)
  201. Langston Hughes, "The Ring" (1926)
  202. Charles Bertram Johnson, "Rain-Mist" (1920)
  203. Walter Everette Hawkins, "Ethiopian Maid" (1917)
  204. Joseph S. Cotter, "The Prophet" (1920)
  205. Lottie Burrill Dixon, "A Rainy Day" (1916)
  206. B.B. Church, "Africa" (1924)
  207. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Tears and Kisses" (1917)
  208. Langston Hughes, "Prayer Meeting" (1923)
  209. Arna Bontemps, "Nocturne at Bethesda" (1926)
  210. William H.A. Moore, "That One Might Live in the Sunlight Glad" (1913)
  211. Clara G. Stillman, "Dark Dream" (1923)
  212. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Soul's Easter" (1925)
  213. Georgia Douglas Johnson, "Again it is the Vibrant May" (1918)
  214. Esther A. Yates “Fettered Liberty” (1915)

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