July 26, 2020

The Puppet-Player

Angelina Weld Grimké

Sometimes it seems as though some puppet-player,
A clenched claw cupping a craggy chin
Sits just beyond the border of our seeing,
Twitching the strings with slow, sardonic grin.

This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on July 26, 2020, by the Academy of American Poets.

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“The Puppet-Player” originally appeared in Negro Poets and Their Poems (Associated Publishers, 1923).

Angelina Weld Grimké was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1880. A journalist, playwright, teacher, author, and poet, she was a prominent figure in the Harlem Renaissance and one of the first African-American women to have one of her plays publicly performed. She died in New York City in 1958.

Negro Poets and Their Poems
(Associated Publishers, 1923)

Black Lives Matter Anthology

“Names stretch across the people’s banner
but when they walk away
the names fall from our lips.”

—“Facing US” by Amanda Johnston

“Reapers” by Jean Toomer
read more

“From the Dark Tower” by Countee Cullen
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Thanks to Mahogany L. Browne, author of Woke: A Young Poet’s Call to Justice (Roaring Brook Press, 2020), who curated Poem-a-Day for July 20-July 31. Read a Q&A about Browne’s curatorial approach and find out more about our guest editors for the year.

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"The Puppet-Player" by Angelina Weld Grimké

The Puppet-Player

Subscribe to the Poem-a-Day Podcast

Black Lives Matter Anthology

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