To Certain Critics by Countee Cullen
Then call me traitor if you must, Shout reason and default! Say I betray a sacred trust Aching beyond this vault. I'll bear your censure as your praise, For never shall the clan Confine my singing to its ways Beyond the ways of man.
No racial option narrows grief, Pain is not patriot, And sorrow plaits her dismal leaf For all as lief as not. With blind sheep groping every hill, Searching an oriflamme, How shall the shpherd heart then thrill To only the darker lamb?
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