After a Reading of “Darkwater”

I did not think... I did not know... 
    What pale excuse is this I make
In answer to my brother’s woe, 
Age-long, for deep injustice sake!

Across his mute and patient soul, 
   While I have gone my heedless way,
The shadows of a fate might roll
   That deepened night and darkened day.

But I have read a burning page,
  That glowed with white and soul-wrung fire,
And now no more I may engage
    My conscience with a feeble hire. 

For all the wrong I did not heed, 
   Chance-born in happier paths to live,
I cry unto my brother’s need
  One word of love and shame... forgive!

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“After a Reading of ‘Darkwater’” originally appeared in the August 1920 issue of The Crisis.

Black Lives Matter Anthology

“I know you are not my enemy. You say there are no enemies
In Spades.”

—“We Should Make a Documentary About Spades” by Terrance Hayes