{"id":23661,"date":"2020-02-07T16:09:55","date_gmt":"2020-02-07T21:09:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theredphoenixapl.org\/?p=23661"},"modified":"2020-02-07T16:09:55","modified_gmt":"2020-02-07T21:09:55","slug":"black-history-month-the-communist-and-internationalist-poetry-of-interwar-harlem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redphoenix.news\/es\/2020\/02\/black-history-month-the-communist-and-internationalist-poetry-of-interwar-harlem\/","title":{"rendered":"Black History Month: The Communist and Internationalist Poetry of Interwar Harlem"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"HR
Left to right, Langston Hughes, Louise Thompson Patterson, and Claude McKay<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“Not to plunge into the complex jungle of  human relationships and analyze them is to leave the field to fascists and I won’t and can’t do that.” \/\/ Richard Wright<\/h4>\n

“Let us sound the bugle-call for militancy. Let us have strong vital criticism, Marxian criticism. Let us have the poetry of the masses. Let us have an international poetry.” \/\/ William Patterson, “Awake Negro-Poets!”<\/h4>\n

“The voice of the red world \/ Is our voice, too.” \/\/ Langston Hughes, Scottsboro Limited<\/em><\/h4>\n

The Harlem Renaissance was a remarkable movement in black art that rose in resistance to post-World War I racial discrimination, particularly lynching, which killed nearly 5,000 African-Americans predominantly in the south, between the late 19th century and mid-20th century. These numbers are commonly understood to be quite low, as local police departments almost always participated in the events. Historian Eric Foner reports in his book Give Me Liberty<\/em>, Vol. 2<\/em>, that during this period, only one lynching occurred in Canada, and it was Americans who went north of the border for the purpose. Thus Harlem Renaissance poets wrote in response to this particularly american form of white supremacy, but their poetic expressions often took on internationalist goals and messages, deeply influenced by the communist movement. Never looking away from the crimes of the American past and present, the poets of the Harlem Renaissance often found the antidote in finding new, international roots, both in reclaiming African identity and celebrating, as Langston Hughes wrote in “Goodbye Christ,” “A real guy named \/ Marx Communist Lenin Peasant Stalin Worker ME.”<\/p>\n

Alaine Locke enshrined this goal in the concept of the “new negro” in his works The New Negro<\/em>, “Enter the New Negro,” and others. For Locke, as he wrote in his forward<\/a> to The New Negro<\/em>, to fight against white supremacy in the US, black poets had to participate in the “nascent movements of folk expression and self-determination” in “India, China, Egypt, Ireland, Russia, Bohemia, Palestine, and Mexico.” This new internationalist view, Locke concludes, was the “dramatic flowering of a new race-spirit tak(ing) place close at home among American Negroes.”<\/p>\n

To celebrate Black History Month, we present you a selection of poems from Langston Hughes<\/strong> and Claude McKay<\/strong> that resulted from these developments. At the end of the collection, we’ve included a further reading list, should you want to learn more on these authors, their communist militancy, and their writing. This list also includes a few editions of the poetry of Louise Thompson Patterson<\/strong>, a black woman poet, friend of Langston Hughes, and life-long communist, whose work has not yet been digitized.<\/p>\n

Claude McKay:<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

“If We Must Die”<\/p>\n

If we must die, let it not be like hogs
\nHunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
\nWhile round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,
\nMaking their mock at our accurs\u00e8d lot.
\nIf we must die, O let us nobly die,
\nSo that our precious blood may not be shed
\nIn vain; then even the monsters we defy
\nShall be constrained to honor us though dead!
\nO kinsmen! we must meet the common foe!
\nThough far outnumbered let us show us brave,
\nAnd for their thousand blows deal one death-blow!
\nWhat though before us lies the open grave?
\nLike men we’ll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
\nPressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Enslaved”<\/p>\n

\n

Oh when I think of my long-suffering race,
\nFor weary centuries despised, oppressed,
\nEnslaved and lynched, denied a human place
\nIn the great life line of the Christian West;
\nAnd in the Black Land disinherited,
\nRobbed in the ancient country of its birth,
\nMy heart grows sick with hate, becomes as lead,
\nFor this my race that has no home on earth.
\nThen from the dark depths of my soul I cry
\nTo the avenging angel to consume
\nThe white man’s world of wonders utterly:
\nLet it be swallowed up in earth’s vast womb,
\nOr upward roll as sacrificial smoke
\nTo liberate my people from its yoke!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Courage”<\/p>\n

\n

O lonely heart so timid of approach,
\nLike the shy tropic flower that shuts its lips
\nTo the faint touch of tender finger tips:
\nWhat is your word? What question would you broach?<\/p>\n

Your lustrous-warm eyes are too sadly kind
\nTo mask the meaning of your dreamy tale,
\nYour guarded life too exquisitely frail
\nAgainst the daggers of my warring mind.<\/p>\n

There is no part of the unyielding earth,
\nEven bare rocks where the eagles build their nest,
\nWill give us undisturbed and friendly rest.
\nNo dewfall softens this vast belt of dearth.<\/p>\n

But in the socket-chiseled teeth of strife,
\nThat gleam in serried files in all the lands,
\nWe may join hungry, understanding hands,
\nAnd drink our share of ardent love and life.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

“Birds of Prey”<\/p>\n

\n

Their shadow dims the sunshine of our day,
\nAs they go lumbering across the sky,
\nSquawking in joy of feeling safe on high,
\nBeating their heavy wings of owlish gray.
\nThey scare the singing birds of earth away
\nAs, greed-impelled, they circle threateningly,
\nWatching the toilers with malignant eye,
\nFrom their exclusive haven–birds of prey.
\nThey swoop down for the spoil in certain might,
\nAnd fasten in our bleeding flesh their claws.
\nThey beat us to surrender weak with fright,
\nAnd tugging and tearing without let or pause,
\nThey flap their hideous wings in grim delight,
\nAnd stuff our gory hearts into their maws.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Langston Hughes:<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

“Open Letter to the South”<\/p>\n

White workers of the South
\nMiners,
\nFarmers,
\nMechanics,
\nMill Hands,
\nShop girls,
\nRailway men,
\nServants,
\nTobacco workers,
\nSharecroppers,
\nGREETINGS!<\/p>\n

I am the black worker,
\nListen:
\nThat the land might be ours,
\nAnd the mines and the factories and the office towers
\nAt Harlan, Richmond, Gastonia, Atlanta, New Orleans;
\nThat the plants and the roads and the tools of power
\nBe ours:<\/p>\n

Let us forget what Booker T. said,
\n“Separate as the fingers.”<\/p>\n

Let us become instead, you and I,
\nOne single hand
\nThat can united rise
\nTo smash the old dead dogmas of the past-
\nTo kill the lies of color
\nThat keep the rich enthroned
\nAnd drive us to the time-clock and the plow
\nHelpless, stupid, scattered, and alone-as now-
\nRace against race,
\nBecause one is black,
\nAnother white of face.<\/p>\n

Let us new lessons learn,
\nAll workers,
\nNew life-ways make,
\nOne union form:
\nUntil the future burns out
\nEvery past mistake
\nLet us together, say:
\n“You are my brother, black or white,
\nYou my sister-now-today!”
\nFor me, no more, the great migration to the North.
\nInstead: migration into force and power-
\nTuskegee with a new flag on the tower!
\non every lynching tree, a poster crying FREE
\nBecause, O poor white workers,
\nYou have linked your hands with me.<\/p>\n

We did not know that we were brothers.
\nNow we know!
\nout of that brotherhood
\nLet power grow!
\nWe did not know
\nThat we were strong.
\nNow we see
\nIn union lies our strength.
\nLet unions be
\nThe force that breaks the time-clock,
\nSmashes misery,
\nTakes land,
\nTakes factories,
\nTakes office towers,
\nTakes tools and banks and mines.
\nRailroads, ships and dams,
\nUntil the forces of the world
\nAre ours!<\/p>\n

White worker,
\nHere is my hand.<\/p>\n

Today,
\nWe’re Man to Man.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Goodbye Christ”<\/p>\n

Listen, Christ,
\nYou did alright in your day, I reckon \u2014
\nBut that day’s gone now.
\nThey ghosted you up a swell story, too,
\nCalled it Bible \u2014
\nBut it’s dead now,
\nThe popes and the preachers’ve
\nMade too much money from it.
\nThey’ve sold you to too many<\/p>\n

Kings, generals, robbers, and killers \u2014
\nEven to the Tzar and the Cossacks,
\nEven to Rockefeller’s Church,
\nEven to THE SATURDAY EVENING POST.
\nYou ain’t no good no more.
\nThey’ve pawned you
\nTill you’ve done wore out.<\/p>\n

Goodbye,
\nChrist Jesus Lord God Jehova,
\nBeat it on away from here now.
\nMake way for a new guy with no religion at all \u2014
\nA real guy named
\nMarx Communist Lenin Peasant Stalin Worker ME \u2014<\/p>\n

I said, ME!
\nGo ahead on now,
\nYou’re getting in the way of things, Lord.
\nAnd please take Saint Ghandi with you when you go,
\nAnd Saint Pope Pius,
\nAnd Saint Aimee McPherson,
\nAnd big black Saint Becton
\nOf the Consecrated Dime.
\nAnd step on the gas, Christ!
\nMove!<\/p>\n

Don’t be so slow about movin’!
\nThe world is mine from now on \u2014
\nAnd nobody’s gonna sell ME
\nTo a king, or a general,
\nOr a millionaire.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Lenin”<\/p>\n

\n

Lenin walks around the world.
\nFrontiers cannot bar him.
\nNeither barracks nor barricades impede.
\nNor does barbed wire scar him.
\nLenin walks around the world.
\nBlack, brown, and white receive him.
\nLanguage is no barrier.
\nThe strangest tongues believe him.
\nLenin walks around the world.
\nThe sun sets like a scar.
\nBetween the darkness and the dawn
\nThere rises a red star.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

“Merry Christmas”<\/p>\n

\n

Merry Christmas, China
\nFrom the gun-boats in the river,
\nTen-inch shells for Christmas gifts,
\nAnd peace on earth forever.
\nMerry Christmas, India,
\nTo Gandhi in his cell,
\nFrom righteous Christian England,
\nRing out, bright Christmas bell!
\nRing Merry Christmas, Africa,
\nFrom Cairo to the Cape!
\nRing Hallehuiah! Praise the Lord!
\n(For murder and rape.)
\nRing Merry Christmas, Haiti!
\n(And drown the voodoo drums \u2013
\nWe\u2019ll rob you to the Christian hymns
\nUntil the next Christ comes.)
\nRing Merry Christmas, Cuba!
\n(While Yankee domination
\nKeeps a nice fat president
\nIn a little half-starved nation.)
\nAnd to you down-and-outers,
\n(\u201cDue to economic laws\u201d)
\nOh, eat, drink, and be merry
\nWith a bread-line Santa Claus \u2013
\nWhile all the world hails Christmas,
\nWhile all the church bells sway!
\nWhile, better still, the Christian guns
\nProclaim this joyous day!
\nWhile holy steel that makes us strong
\nSpits forth a mighty Yuletide song:
\nSHOOT Merry Christmas everywhere!
\nLet Merry Christmas GAS the air!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

“Song for Ourselves”<\/p>\n

\n

Czechoslovakia lynched on a swastika cross!
\nBlow, bitter winds, blow!
\nBlow, bitter winds, blow!
\nNails in her hands and nails in her feet,
\nLeft to die slow!
\nLeft to die slow!
\nCzechoslovakia! Ethiopia! Spain!
\nOne after another!
\nOne after another!
\nWhere will the long snake of greed strike again?
\nWill it be here, brother?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

“One More S in the USA”<\/p>\n

\n

Put one more s in the U.S.A.
\nTo make it Soviet.
\nOne more s in the U.S.A.
\nOh, we’ll live to see it yet.
\nWhen the land belongs to the farmers
\nAnd the factories to the working men \u2014
\nThe U.S.A. when we take control
\nWill be the U.S.S.A. then.<\/p>\n

Now across the water in Russia
\nThey have a big U.S.S.R.
\nThe fatherland of the Soviets \u2014
\nBut that is mighty far
\nFrom New York, or Texas, or California, too.
\nSo listen, fellow workers,
\nThis is what we have to do.<\/p>\n

Put one more S in the U.S.A.
\n[Repeat chorus]<\/p>\n

But we can’t win by just talking.
\nSo let us take things in our hand.
\nThen down and away with the bosses’ sway \u2014
\nHail Communistic land.
\nSo stand up in battle and wave our flag on high,
\nAnd shout out fellow workers
\nOur new slogan in the sky:<\/p>\n

Put one more S in the U.S.A.<\/p>\n

But we can’t join hands together
\nSo long as whites are lynching black,
\nSo black and white in one union fight
\nAnd get on the right track.
\nBy Texas, or Georgia, or Alabama led
\nCome together, fellow workers
\nBlack and white can all be red:<\/p>\n

Put one more S in the U.S.A.<\/p>\n

Oh, the bankers they all are planning
\nFor another great big war.
\nTo make them rich from the worker’s dead,
\nThat’s all the war is for.
\nSo if you don’t want to see bullets holding sway
\nThen come on, all you workers,
\nAnd join our fight today:<\/p>\n

Put one more S in the U.S.A.
\nTo make it Soviet.
\nOne more S in the U.S.A.
\nOh, we’ll live to see it yet.
\nWhen the land belongs to the farmers
\nAnd the factories to the working men \u2014
\nThe U.S.A. when we take control
\nWill be the U.S.S.A. then.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“Beaumont to Detroit: 1943”<\/p>\n

\n

Looky here, America
\nWhat you done done
\nLet things drift
\nUntil the riots come.<\/p>\n

Now your policemen
\nLet your mobs run free.
\nI reckon you don\u2019t care
\nNothing about me.<\/p>\n

You tell me that Hitler
\nIs a mighty bad man.
\nI guess he took lessons
\nFrom the ku klux klan.<\/p>\n

You tell me mussolini\u2019s
\nGot an evil heart
\nWell, it mus-a-been in Beaumont
\nThat he had his start<\/p>\n

Cause everything that hitler
\nAnd Mussolini do,
\nNegroes get the same
\nTreatment from you.<\/p>\n

You jim crowed me
\nBefore hitler rose to power
\nAnd you\u2019re STILL jim crowing me
\nRight now, this very hour.<\/p>\n

Yet you say we\u2019re fighting
\nFor democracy
\nThen why don\u2019t democracy
\nInclude me?<\/p>\n

I ask you this question
\nCause I want to know
\nHow long I got to fight
\nBOTH HITLER \u2013 AND JIM CROW<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

“Will V-Day Be Me Day Too?”<\/p>\n

Over There,
\nWorld War II.<\/p>\n

Dear Fellow Americans,
\nI write this letter
\nHoping times will be better
\nWhen this war
\nIs through.
\nI’m a Tan-skinned Yank
\nDriving a tank.
\nI ask, WILL V-DAY
\nBE ME-DAY, TOO?<\/p>\n

I wear a U. S. uniform.
\nI’ve done the enemy much harm,
\nI’ve driven back
\nThe Germans and the Japs,
\nFrom Burma to the Rhine.
\nOn every battle line,
\nI’ve dropped defeat
\nInto the Fascists’ laps.<\/p>\n

I am a Negro American
\nOut to defend my land
\nArmy, Navy, Air Corps–
\nI am there.
\nI take munitions through,
\nI fight–or stevedore, too.
\nI face death the same as you do
\nEverywhere.<\/p>\n

I’ve seen my buddy lying
\nWhere he fell.
\nI’ve watched him dying
\nI promised him that I would try
\nTo make our land a land
\nWhere his son could be a man–
\nAnd there’d be no Jim Crow birds
\nLeft in our sky.<\/p>\n

So this is what I want to know:
\nWhen we see Victory’s glow,
\nWill you still let old Jim Crow
\nHold me back?
\nWhen all those foreign folks who’ve waited–
\nItalians, Chinese, Danes–are liberated.
\nWill I still be ill-fated
\nBecause I’m black?<\/p>\n

Here in my own, my native land,
\nWill the Jim Crow laws still stand?
\nWill Dixie lynch me still
\nWhen I return?
\nOr will you comrades in arms
\nFrom the factories and the farms,
\nHave learned what this war
\nWas fought for us to learn?<\/p>\n

When I take off my uniform,
\nWill I be safe from harm–
\nOr will you do me
\nAs the Germans did the Jews?
\nWhen I’ve helped this world to save,
\nShall I still be color’s slave?
\nOr will Victory change
\nYour antiquated views?<\/p>\n

You can’t say I didn’t fight
\nTo smash the Fascists’ might.
\nYou can’t say I wasn’t with you
\nin each battle.
\nAs a soldier, and a friend.
\nWhen this war comes to an end,
\nWill you herd me in a Jim Crow car
\nLike cattle?<\/p>\n

Or will you stand up like a man
\nAt home and take your stand
\nFor Democracy?
\nThat’s all I ask of you.
\nWhen we lay the guns away
\nTo celebrate
\nOur Victory Day
\nWILL V-DAY BE ME-DAY, TOO?
\nThat’s what I want to know.<\/p>\n

Sincerely,
\nGI Joe.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Further Reading: <\/strong><\/p>\n

Dawahare, Anthony. Nationalism, Marxism, and African American Literature between the Wars: a New Pandora’s Box<\/i>. University Press of Mississippi, 2007.<\/p>\n

Gilyard, Keith. Louise Thompson Patterson: a Life of Struggle for Justice<\/i>. Duke University Press, 2017.<\/p>\n

Howard, Walter T. We Shall Be Free!: Black Communist Protests in Seven Voices<\/i>. Temple Univ. Press, 2013.<\/p>\n

Hughes, Langston, and Louise Thompson Patterson. Poetry, Politics, and Friendship in the Spanish Civil War<\/i>. Center for the Humanities, Graduate Center, The City University of New York, 2012.<\/p>\n

Johnson, Howard Eugene., and Wendy Johnson. A Dancer in the Revolution: Stretch Johnson, Harlem Communist at the Cotton Club<\/i>. Empire State Editions, 2014.<\/p>\n

Lewis, David, editor. The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader<\/i>. Penguin, 2008.<\/p>\n

Maxwell, William J. New Negro, Old Left: African-American Writing and Communism between the Wars<\/i>. Columbia University Press, 1999.<\/p>\n

Naison, Mark D. Communists in Harlem during the Depression<\/i>. University of Illinois Press, 2005.<\/p>\n

Ofari, Earl. Blacks and Reds: Race and Class Conflict, 1919-1990<\/i>. Michigan State University Press, 1995.<\/p>\n

Ofari, Earl. Blacks and Reds: Race and Class Conflict, 1919-1990<\/i>. Michigan State University Press, 1995.<\/p>\n

Smethurst, James Edward. The New Red Negro: the Literary Left and African American Poetry, 1930-1946<\/i>. Oxford Univ. Press, 1999.<\/p>\n

Solomon, Mark I. The Cry Was Unity: Communists and African Americans, 1919-36<\/i>. University Press of Mississippi, 1998.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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