Color

Authors

• Countee Cullen

Document Type

Archival Material

Date of this Version

1925

Citation

Cullen, Countee. 1925. Color. Harper & Brothers, New York and London.

Comments

Copyright © 1925; now public domain.

Abstract

Poet, playwright, novelist, graduate of DeWitt Clinton High, New York University, and Harvard University, Countee Cullen (1903–1946) emerged as a leading literary figure of the Harlem Renaissance. Color (1925), his first published book of poetry, confronts head-on what W.E.B. DuBois called “the problem of the 20th century—the problem of the color line.” The work includes 72 poems, such as the following:

Incident (For Eric Walrond)

Once riding in old Baltimore,
Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,
I saw a Baltimorean
Keep looking straight at me.

Now I was eight and very small,
And he was no whit bigger,
And so I smiled, but he poked out
His tongue, and called me, “Nigger.”

I saw the whole of Baltimore
From May until December;
Of all the things that happened there
That’s all that I remember.

Poems include:

TO YOU WHO READ MY BOOK • YET DO I MARVEL • A SONG OF PRAISE • BROWN BOY TO BROWN GIRL • A BROWN GIRL DEAD • TO A BROWN GIRL • TO A BROWN BOY • BLACK MAGDALENS • ATLANTIC CITY WAITER • NEAR WHITE • TABLEAU • HARLEM WINE • SIMON THE CYRENIAN SPEAKS • INCIDENT • TWO WHO CROSSED A LINE (SHE CROSSES) • TWO WHO CROSSED A LINE (HE CROSSES) • SATURDAY'S CHILD • THE DANCE OF LOVE • PAGAN PRAYER • WISDOM COMETH WITH THE YEARS • TO MY FAIRER BRETHREN • FRUIT OF THE FLOWER • THE SHROUD OF COLOR • HERITAGE

EPITAPHS: FOR A POET • FOR MY GRANDMOTHER • FOR A CYNIC • FOR A SINGER • FOR A VIRGIN • FOR A LADY I KNOW • FOR A LOVELY LADY • FOR AN ATHEIST • FOR AN EVOLUTIONIST AND HIS OPPONENT • FOR AN ANARCHIST • FOR A MAGICIAN • FOR A PESSIMIST • FOR A MOUTHY WOMAN • FOR A PHILOSOPHER • FOR AN UNSUCCESSFUL SINNER • FOR A FOOL • FOR ONE WHO GAYLY SOWED HIS OATS • FOR A SKEPTIC • FOR A FATALIST • FOR DAUGHTERS OF MAGDALEN • FOR A WANTON • FOR A PREACHER • FOR ONE WHO DIED SINGING OF DEATH • FOR JOHN KEATS, APOSTLE OF BEAUTY • FOR HAZEL HALL, AMERICAN POET • FOR PAUL LAWRENCE DUNBAR • FOR JOSEPH CONRAD • FOR MYSELF • ALL THE DEAD

FOR LOVE'S SAKE: OH, FOR A LITTLE WHILE BE KIND • IF YOU SHOULD GO • TO ONE WHO SAID ME NAY • ADVICE TO YOUTH • CAPRICE • SACRAMENT • BREAD AND WINE • SPRING REMINISCENCE • VARIA: SUICIDE CHANT • SHE OF THE DANCING FEET SINGS • JUDAS ISCARIOT • THE WISE • MARY, MOTHER OF CHRIST • DIALOGUE • IN MEMORY OF COL. CHARLES YOUNG • TO MY FRIENDS • GODS • TO JOHN KEATS, POET, AT SPRINGTIME • ON GOING • HARSH WORLD THAT LASHEST ME • REQUIESCAM

DOI: 10.32873/unl.dc.zea.1336