Amos, 1963
Amos is a Shepherd of suffering sheep;
A pastor preaching in the depths of Alabama
Preaching social justice to the Southland
Preaching to the poor a new gospel of love
With the words of a god and the dreams of a man
Amos is our loving Shepherd of the sheep
Crying out to the stricken land
“You have sold the righteous for silver
And the poor for a pair of shoes.
My God is a mighty avenger
And He shall come with His rod in His hand.”
Preaching to the persecuted and the disinherited millions
Preaching love and justice to the solid southern land
Amos is a Prophet with a vision of brotherly love
With a vision and a dream of the red hills of Georgia
“When Justice shall roll down like water
And righteousness like a mighty stream.”
Amos is our Shepherd standing in the Shadow of our God
Tending his flocks all over the hills of Albany
And the seething streets of Selma and of bitter Birmingham.
From This Is My Century: New and Collected Poems (University of Georgia Press, 1989). Used with the permission of the University of Georgia Press.
Margaret Walker
Margaret Walker was born in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1915. The first African American poet to receive the Yale Younger Poets Prize, she was the author of For My People (Yale University Press, 1942) and This Is My Century: New and Collected Poems (University of Georgia Press, 1989), among others.