To A Brown Boy

That brown girl’s swagger gives a twitch
    To beauty like a queen;
Lad, never dam your body’s itch
    When loveliness is seen.

For there is ample room for bliss
    In pride in clean, brown limbs,
And lips know better how to kiss
    Than how to raise white hymns.

And when your body’s death gives birth
    To soil for spring to crown,
Men will not ask if that rare earth
    Was white flesh once, or brown.

Credit

This poem is in the public domain.