Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the ESCTATIC Mood:

A WELCOME SONG FOR LAINI NZINGA By Gwendolyn Brooks [p.501]

Born November 24, 1975

Hello, little Sister.
Coming through the rim of the world.
We are here! to meet you and to mold and to maintain you.
With excited eyes we see you.
With welcoming ears we hear the
clean sound of new language.
The language of Laini Nzinga.
We love and we receive you as our own.

Original poem curated by the second year Sojourner Scholars paired with “A WELCOME SONG FOR LAINI NZINGA”:

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the REALLY GOOD” Mood:

“To Those Of My Sisters
Who Kept Their Naturals”

— never to look a hot comb in the teeth

by Gwendolyn Brooks [p. 459]

Sisters!

I love you.
Because you love you.
Because you are erect.
Because you are also bent.
In season, stern, kind.
Crisp, soft-in season.
And you withhold.
And you extend.
And you Step out.
And you go back.
And you extend again.
Your eyes, loud-soft, with crying and with smiles,
are older than a million years,
And they are young.
You reach, in season.
And All
below the richrouch righttime of your hair.
You have not bought Blondine.
You have not hailed the hot-comb recently.
You never worshipped Marilyn Monroe.
You say: Farrah’s hair is hers.
You have not wanted to be white.
Nor have you testified to adoration of that state
with the advertisement of imitation
(never successful because the hot-comb is laughing too.)
But oh the rough dark Other music!
the Real,
the Right.
The natural Respect of Self and Seal!
Sisters!
Your hair is Celebration in the world!

Original poem curated by Clarence Sanford paired with “Sisters!”:

Clarence Sanford is a chill person who likes to workout.

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the PRETTY GOOD -*SUNNY Mood:

Still do I keep my look, my identity… by Gwendolyn Brooks [p.65]

Each body has its art, its precious prescribed
Pose, that even in passion’s droll contortions, waltzes,
Or push of pain – or when a grief has stabbed,
Or hatred hacked – is its, and nothing else’s.
Each body has its pose. No other stock
That is irrevocable, perpetual
And its to keep. In castle or in shack.
With rags or robes. Through good, nothing, or ill.
And even in death a bod, like no other
On any hill or plain or crawling cot
Or gentle for the lilyless hasty pall
(Having twisted, gagged, and then sweet-ceased to bother),
Shows the old personal art, the look. Shows what
It showed at baseball. What it showed in school.

Original poem curated by Traviana Archer paired with “Still do I keep my look, my identity”:

Traviana Archer likes to be called Travi, is lovable, sweet yet mean and identifies as an outsider. Travi loves anime, kpop, kdrama, is very creative and says, “Singing is my life!” Travi says the song Better Days by Super M is the music to go with the poem My Life, My Pretty Good Expression.

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the MEH Mood:

THE OLD-MARRIEDS by Gwendolyn Brooks [p.19]
But in the crowding darkness not a word did they say.
Though the pretty-coated birds had piped so lightly all the day.
And he had seen the lovers in the little side streets.
And she had heard the morning stories clogged with sweets.
It was quite a time for loving. It was midnight. It was May.
But in the crowding darkness not a word did they say.

Original poem curated by Arielle Erskin paired with “THE OLD-MARRIEDS”:

Arielle Erskin is an upcoming senior at Simeon Career Academy who loves writing and getting creative.

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem* inspiring the MEH Mood:

Primer For Blacks by Gwendolyn Brooks
Blackness
is a title,
is a preoccupation,
is a commitment Blacks
are to comprehend—
and in which you are
to perceive your Glory.

The conscious shout
of all that is white is
“It’s Great to be white.”
The conscious shout
of the slack in Black is
“It’s Great to be white.”
Thus all that is white
has white strength and yours.

The word Black
has geographic power,
pulls everybody in:
Blacks here—
Blacks there—
Blacks wherever they may be.
And remember, you Blacks, what they told you—
remember your Education:
“one Drop—one Drop
maketh a brand new Black.”
Oh mighty Drop.
______And because they have given us kindly
so many more of our people

Blackness
stretches over the land.
Blackness—
the Black of it,
the rust-red of it,
the milk and cream of it,
the tan and yellow-tan of it,
the deep-brown middle-brown high-brown of it,
the “olive” and ochre of it—
Blackness
marches on.

The huge, the pungent object of our prime out-ride
is to Comprehend,
to salute and to Love the fact that we are Black,
which is our “ultimate Reality,”
which is the lone ground
from which our meaningful metamorphosis,
from which our prosperous staccato,
group or individual, can rise.

Self-shriveled Blacks.
Begin with gaunt and marvelous concession:
YOU are our costume and our fundamental bone.

All of you—
you COLORED ones,
you NEGRO ones,
those of you who proudly cry
“I’m half INDian”—
those of you who proudly screech
“I’VE got the blood of George WASHington in MY veins”
ALL of you—
you proper Blacks,
you half-Blacks,
you wish-I-weren’t Blacks,
Niggeroes and Niggerenes.

You

*This selection is not from the Blacks collection. 

Original poem curated by Jamie Koonce paired with “Primer For Blacks”:

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the GLOOMY Mood:

Matthew Cole by Gwendolyn Brooks [p. 40]

Here are the facts.
He’s sixty-six.
He rooms in a stove-heated flat
Over on Lafayette.
He has roomed there ten years long.
He never will be done.
With dust and his ceiling that
Is everlasting sad,
And the gloomy housekeeper
Who forget to build the fire,
And the red fat roaches that stroll
Unafraid up his wall,
And the whiteless grin of the housekeeper
On Saturday night when he pays his four
Dollars, the ceaseless Sunday row
Of her big cheap radio…

She’ll tell you he is the pleasantest man-
Always a smile, a smile… But in
The door-locked dirtiness of his room
He never smiles. Except when come,
Say, thoughts of a little boy licorice-full
Without a nickel for Sunday School.
Or thoughts of a little boy playing ball
And swearing at sound of his mother’s call.
Once, I think, he laughed aloud,
At thought of a wonderful joke he’d played
On the whole crowd, the old crowd…

Original poem curated by Antowann Carter paired with “Matthew Cole”:

Antowann Carter likes watching anime and playing sports.

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the WORRY & FEAR Mood:

The Battle by Gwendolyn Brooks [p.55]

Moe BELLE JACKSON’S husband
Whipped her good last night.
Her landlady told my ma they had
A knock-down-drag-out fight.

I like to think
Of how I’d of took a knife
And slashed all of the quickenin’
Out of his lowly life.

But if I know Moe Belle,
Most like, he shed a tear,
And this mornin’ it was probably,
“More grits, dear?”

Original poem curated by Janasha Lewis paired with “The Battle”:

Janasha Lewis is a young inspiring chef who loves to try new things.

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the TIRED/SICK Mood:

INFIRM by Gwendolyn Brooks [p. 512]

Everybody here
is infirm.
Everybody here is infirm.
Oh. Mend me. Mend me. Lord.

Today I
say to them
say to them
say to them. Lord:
look! I am beautiful, beautiful with
my wing that is wounded
my eye that is bonded
or my ear not funded
or my walk all a wobble.
I’m enough to be beautiful.

You are
beautiful too.

Original poem curated by the Sojourner Scholars Second Year Collaboration paired with “INFIRM”:

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the STRESSED Mood:

The children of the poor by Gwendolyn Brooks [p.115]
1

People who have no children can be hard:
Attain a mail of ice and insolence:
Need not pause in the fire, and in no sense
Hesitate in the hurricane to guard.
And when wide world is bitten and bewarred
They perish purely, waving their spirits hence
Without a trace of grace or of offense
To laugh or fail, diffident, wonder-starred.
While through a throttling dark we others hear
The little lifting helplessness, the queer
Whimper-whine; whose unridiculous
Lost softness softly makes a trap for us.
And makes a curse. And makes a sugar of
The malocclusions, the inconditions of love.

2

What shall I give my children? who are poor,
Who are adjudged the leastwise of the land,
Who are my sweetest lepers, who demand
No velvet and no velvety velour;
But who have begged me for a brisk contour,
Crying that they are quasi, contraband
Because unfinished, graven by a hand
Less than angelic, admirable or sure.
My hand is stuffed with mode, design, device.
But I lack access to my proper stone.
And plenitude of plan shall not suffice
Nor grief nor love shall be enough alone
To ratify my little halves who bear
Across an autumn freezing everywhere.

3

And shall I prime my children, pray, to pray?
Mites, come invade most frugal vestibules
Spectered with crusts of penitents’ renewals
And all hysterics arrogant for a day.
Instruct yourselves here is no devil to pay.
Children, confine your lights in jellied rules;
Resemble graves; be metaphysical mules.
Learn Lord will not distort nor leave the fray.
Behind the scurryings of your neat motif
I shall wait, if you wish: revise the psalm
If that should frighten you: sew up belief
If that should tear: turn, singularly calm
At forehead and at fingers rather wise,
Holding the bandage ready for your eyes.

Original poem curated by Armani Easter paired with “The children of the poor”:

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the STRESSED Mood:

A Man of the Middle Class by Gwendolyn Brooks [p. 355]

I’m what has gone out blithely and with noise
Returning! I’m what rushed around to pare
Down rind, to find fruit frozen under there.

I am bedraggled, with sundry dusts to be shed;
Trailing desperate tarnished tassels. These strident Aprils
With terrifying polka and Bugle Calls
Confound me.

– Although I’ve risen! and my back is bold.
My tongue is brainy, choosing from among
Care, rage, surprise, despair, and choosing care.
I’m semi-splendid within what I’ve defended.

Yet, there I totter, there limp laxly. My
Uncomely trudge
To Plateau That and platitudinous Plateau
Whichever is no darling to my grudge-
Choked industry or usual alcohol.

I’ve roses to guard
In the architectural prettiness of my yard.
(But there are no paths remarkable for wide
Believable welcomes.)

I have loved directions.
I have loved orders and an iron to stride, I,
Whose hands are papers now,
Fit only for tossing in this outrageous air.

Not God nor grace nor candy balls
Will get me everything different and the same!

My wife has canvas walls.

My wife never quite forgets to put flowers in vases,
Bizarre prints in the most unusual places,
Give teas for poets, wear odoriferous fur,
An awful blooming is hers.

I’ve antique firearms. Blackamoors. Chinese
Rugs. Ivories.

Bronzes. Everything I Wanted.
But have I answer? Oh Methinks
I’ve answers such as have
The executives I copied long ago,
The ones who, forfeiting Vicks salve,
Prayer book and Mother, shot themselves last Sunday.

All forsaking
All that was theirs but for their money’s taking.
I’ve answers such as Giants used to know.
There’s a Giant who’ll jump next Monday; all forsaking
Wives, safes and solitaire
And the elegant statue at the foot of the stair.

Original poem curated by Zacarria Porter paired with “A Man of the Middle Class”:

Zacarria Porter is a rising Senior who loves to read, execute her creativity, and experience new things.

Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem from the Blacks collection inspiring the ANGRY Mood:

Boy Breaking Glass by Gwendolyn Brooks [p. 438]

To Marc Crawford
from whom the commission

Whose broken window is a cry of art
(success, that winks aware
as elegance, as a treasonable faith)
is raw: is sonic: is old-eyed première.
Our beautiful flaw and terrible ornament.
Our barbarous and metal little man.

“I shall create! If not a note, a hole.
If not an overture, a desecration.”

Full of pepper and light
and Salt and night and cargoes.

“Don’t go down the plank
if you see there’s no extension.
Each to his grief, each to
his loneliness and fidgety revenge.
Nobody knew where I was and now I am no longer there.”

The only sanity is a cup of tea.
The music is in minors.

Each one other
is having different weather.

“It was you, it was you who threw away my name!
And this is everything I have for me.”

Who has not Congress, lobster, love, luau,
the Regency Room, the Statue of Liberty,
runs. A sloppy amalgamation.
A mistake.
A cliff.
A hymn, a snare, and an exceeding sun.

Original poem curated by Nicole Bond paired with “Boy Breaking Glass”:

Living my life like it’s Golden Shovel to Bury an Exquisite Corpse

Golden Shovel poem and Exquisite Corpse poem written by Sojourner Scholars Second Year Collaboration

The Golden Shovel Poetry Form takes an existing poem and uses the last word at the end of each line as the last word at the end of each line in a new poem or it uses each word in a single line or stanza from an existing poem as the end words of each line of a new poem. Try it!

Sandra Swift is a Sojourner Scholars Alumni and is the best teaching assistant on the planet.

Exquisite Corpse Poetry Form is a poetry nerd party game where participants write a poem together – one line or one word at a time, while only seeing the last word or line written by the previous participant. Try it!

Images by Traviana Archer