Summary

Black poets from the early twentieth century and onward come together for a moving anthology, edited and organized by the late, revered poet June Jordan. First published in 1970,soulscriptis a poignant, panoramic collection of poetry from some of the most eloquent voices in the art. Selected for their literary excellence and by the dictates of Jordan's heart, these works tell the story of both collective and personal experiences, in Jordan's words, "in tears, in rage, in hope, in sonnet, in blank/free verse, in overwhelming rhetorical scream." Soulscriptfeatures works by Jordan and other luminaries like Gwendolyn Brooks, Countee Cullen, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Nikki Giovanni, Langston Hughes, Gayl Jines, James Weldon Johnson, Audre Lorde, Claude McKay, Ishmael Reed, Sonia Sanchez, and Richard Wright, as well as the fresh voices of a turbulent era's younger writers. Celebrated spoken-word poet Staceyann Chin, an original cast member ofDef Poetry Jam on Broadway, has also added an introduction that speaks to Jordan's legacy, helping to further cementsoulscriptas a visionary compilation that has already become a modern classic.

Author Biography

JUNE JORDAN was an internationally recognized and beloved writer, teacher, and activist. The author of several books of poetry, including Kissing God Goodbye, Haruko/Love Poems, Who Look at Me, and Things That I Do in the Dark , she died from breast cancer in 2002.

Foreword
Introduction
Reflections	p. 3
Monument in black	p. 4
Foxey lady	p. 5
Epilogue	p. 6
I am waiting	p. 7
April 4, 1968	p. 8
Death prosecuting	p. 10
No way out	p. 11
Hands	p. 12
The air is dirty	p. 13
Dedication to the final confrontation	p. 14
Tripart	p. 15
Many die here	p. 16
Satori	p. 18
My people	p. 21
Mother to son	p. 22
Fruit of the flower	p. 23
Those winter Sundays	p. 25
Nikki-Rosa	p. 26
The bean eaters	p. 27
On the birth of my son, Malcolm Coltrane	p. 28
Award	p. 30
Five winters age	p. 31
Uncle Bull-boy	p. 32
To my son Parker, asleep in the next room	p. 34
Song of the Son	p. 36
Preface to a twenty volume suicide note	p. 37
Blues note	p. 41
At that moment (for Malcolm X)	p. 43
Runagate runagate	p. 45
Frederick Douglass	p. 49
Malcolm X - an autobiography	p. 50
In time of crisis	p. 53
The ballad of Rudolph Reed	p. 54
Blind and deaf old woman	p. 57
After winter	p. 58
Holyghost woman : an ole nomad moving thru the South	p. 60
Second Avenue encounter	p. 61
If you saw a Negro lady	p. 62
Ameican gothic	p. 67
Counterpoint	p. 68
The creation	p. 69
Reapers	p. 73
Beware : do not read this poem	p. 74
Mud in Vietnam	p. 76
lXVXII	p. 80
Of faith : confessional	p. 81
Brown river, smile	p. 83
The end of man is his beauty	p. 88
As a possible lover	p. 90
This age	p. 91
Sonnet	p. 92
Madhouse	p. 93
Number 5 - December	p. 97
Poem	p. 98
Song	p. 99
Naturally	p. 100
Summer Oracle	p. 101
Iron years : for money	p. 103
Off d pig	p. 104
A poem looking for a reader	p. 107
Moonlight moonlight	p. 110
Coal	p. 111
Air	p. 112
The distant drum	p. 113
It's here in the	p. 114
This morning	p. 115
Georia dusk	p. 119
The Louisiana weekly #4	p. 121
Right on : white America	p. 122
Rhythm is a groove (#2)	p. 123
Now, all you children	p. 124
Incident	p. 125
From riot rimes : USA	p. 126
From 26 ways of looking at a blackman	p. 127
Riot laugh & I talk	p. 128
I substitute for the dead lecturer	p. 129
I have seen black hands	p. 131
In memoriam : Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. (part one)	p. 134
Motto	p. 139
The White House	p. 140
O Daedalus, fly away home	p. 141
November cotton flower	p. 142
I know I'm not sufficiently obscure	p. 143
Sorrow is the only faithful one	p. 144
An Agony. As now	p. 145
Midway	p. 147
One thousand nine hundred & sixty - eight winters	p. 148
Yet do I marvel	p. 149
Dream variation	p. 150
We have been believers	p. 151
Nocturne varial	p. 153
From the dark tower	p. 154
We wear the mask	p. 155
If we must die	p. 156
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.

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Excerpts

MY PEOPLE by Langston Hughes

The night is beautiful,
So the faces of my people.

The stars are beautiful,
So the eyes of my people.

Beautiful, also, is the sun.
Beautiful, also, are the souls of my people.

UNCLE BULL-BOY by June Jordan

His brother after dinner
once a year would play the piano
short and tough in white shirt
plaid suspenders green tie and
checked trousers.
Two teeth were gold. His eyes
were pink with alcohol. His fingers
thumped for Auld Lang Syne.
He played St. Louis Woman
Boogie, Blues, the light
pedestrian.

But one night after dinner
after chitterlings and pigs' feet
after bourbon and rum and rye
after turnip greens and mustard greens
and sweet potato pie
Bullboy looking everywhere
realized his brother was not there.

Who would emphasize the luxury
of ice cream by the gallon who would
repeat effusively the glamour not the gall
of five degrees outstanding on the wall?
Which head would nod and then recall
the crimes the apples stolen from the stalls
the soft coal stolen by the pile?
Who would admire
the eighteenth pair of forty
dollar shoes?
Who could extol their mother with good
brandy as his muse?

His brother dead from drinking
Bullboy drank to clear his thinking
saw the roach inside the riddle.
Soon the bubbles from his glass
were the only bits of charm
which overcame his folded arms.

AMERICAN GOTHIC by Paul Vesey
To Satch
(The legendary Satchel Page, one of the star pitchers in Negro baseball)

Sometimes I feel like I will never stop
Just go on forever
Til one fine mornin'

I'm gonna reach up and grab me a handfulla stars
Swing out my long lean leg
And whip three hot strikes burnin' down the heavens
And look over at God and say
How about that!

Excerpted from Soulscript: A Collection of Classic African American Poetry by June Jordan
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.