Fenton Johnson - 6 Short Poems (1913-1927)

Forgotten Poems #100

    
              —: Revery :—

                     I

       I was the starlight,
       I was the moonlight,
       I was the sunset.
       Before the dawning
       Of my life;
       I was the river
       Forever winding
       To purple dreaming,
       I was the glowing
       Of youthful Springtime,
       I was the singing
       Of golden songbirds,—
       I was love.

                     II

       I was the sunlight,
       I was the twilight,
       I was the humming
       Of winged creatures
       Ere my birth;
       I was the blushing
       Of lily maiden,
       I was the vision
       Of youthful striving,
       I was the summer,
       I was the autumn,
       I was the All-time—
       I was love.
    

     
              —: Let Us Go Away :—

       Let us go away,
       You and I,
       On a crimson ray,
       From the sky.
       Let us feel the blue
       Soft and clear,
       And the golden hue,
       Be so near.
       For the morn is fair
       Where stars lie,
       Let us two go there,
       You and I.
       

     
              —: The Drunkard :—

       I had a wife, but she is gone. She left me a week
            ago. God bless her!
       I married another in the rear of Mike's saloon.
            It was a gallon jug of the reddest liquor that
            ever burned the throat of man. I will be true
            to my new wife. You can have the other.
    

     
              —: Tired :—

       I am tired of work; I am tired of building up some-
            body else's civilization.
       Let us take a rest, M'Lissy Jane.
       I will go down to the Last Chance Saloon, drink
            a gallon or two of gin, shoot a game or two of
            dice and sleep the rest of the night on one of
            Mike's barrels.
       You will let the old shanty go to rot, the white
            people's clothes turn to dust, and the Calvary
            Baptist Church sink to the bottomless pit.
       You will spend your days forgetting you married me
            and your nights hunting the warm gin Mike
            serves the ladies in the rear of the Last
            Chance Saloon.
       Throw the children into the river; civilization has
            given us too many. It is better to die than it is
            to grow up and find out that you are colored.
       Pluck the stars out of the heavens. The stars mark
            our destiny. The stars marked my destiny.
                 I am tired of civilization.
     

     
               —: The Artist :—

       It is a wonderful world that greets me.
       I can hear the music of a wild rose in June, riotous
            with the joy of living.
       I can hear the soft music of snowflakes falling in
            November.
       I remember the wind singing through the pines in
            Georgia, singing the songs my fathers chanted
            in the days of slavery.
       I remember magnolias dropping upon the grave of
            my grandmother, a pathetic melody.
       Sunlight, moonlight, dawn and dusk walk with me
            and talk with me, telling me strange tales of
            the jungle and the desert, of wild beasts and
            slave gangs, of kings and mighty warriors.
       In the dewdrop I see the eyes of a Pharaoh, angry
            at the desolation of his land by the hordes
            of Ethiopian warriors.
       In the mist I see the rise of a new Ethiopia, liberator
            of a world long stagnant.
       Who cares to hear my song of this wonderful world?
            Who cares?
      

    
              —: When I Die :—

       When I die my song shall be
       Crooning of the summer breeze;
       When I die my shroud shall be
       Leaves plucked from the maple trees;
       On a couch as green as moss
       And a bed as soft as down,
       I shall sleep and dream my dream
       Of a poet's laurel crown.

       When I die my star shall drop
       Singing like a nightingale;
       When I die my soul shall rise
       Where the lyre-strings never fail;
       In the rose my blood shall lie,
       In the violet the smile,
       And the moonbeams thousand strong
       Past my grave each night shall file.
    

Fenton Johnson (1888-1958): “I came into the world in 1888. No notice was taken of the event save in immediate circles. I presume the world was too busy or preoccupied to note it. It happened in Chicago. I went to school and also college. My scholastic record never attained me any notoriety.”

“Taught school one year and repented. Having scribbled since the age of nine, had some plays produced on the stage of the old Pekin Theatre, Chicago, at the time I was nineteen. When I was twenty-four my first volume A Little Dreaming (1913) was published. Since then Visions of the Dusk (1915) and Songs of the Soil (1916) represent my own collections of my work. Also published a volume of short stories Tales of Darkest America (1920) and a group of essays on American politics For the Highest Good (1920).” (Caroling Dusk, 1927)

Johnson was a forerunner to the Harlem renaissance and his poems frequented the pages of numerous ‘new verse’ magazines, including Harriet Monroe’s Poetry and Alfred Kreymborg’s Others. He went on to found and edit The Champion in 1916 with his cousin Henry Bing Dismond, a magazine highlighting black achievement, and The Favourite Magazine in 1918: “The first and only weekly magazine published by and for colored people.”

In the 1930s Johnson worked for the Illinois chapter of the Federal Writers’ Project, under the direction of fellow poet Arna Bontemps, which focussed on collecting writings on the black experience in Illinois and helped launch the careers of numerous writers, including the poets Richard Wright and Margaret Walker, and novelist Frank Yerby. After Johnson’s death in 1958, Bontemps would go on to be the executor of his literary estate.

    
               —: After Fenton Johnson :—
                                 [For B.]
                           By Dick Whyte

              I.

       figurated night—

       slender
       we leave the lake

              II.

       down
       the mountain path

       mouths
       filled with feathers:

       it starts to rain

              III.

       huddled
       in a makeshift shelter,

       & cicadas

              IV.

       bodies
       warm where they touch:

       guardians
       of the threshold

       be kind

              V.

       the past
       a patchwork of ghosts,

       gathering wood

              VI.

       handful of dirt

       mixed
       with water—

       closing the eyes
       of a god

              VII.

       moths:

       protecting the river
       from the river

              VIII.

       smooth
       skin of a field,

       more grass

       where the bones
       are buried

              IX.

       a stone that sings—

       worthy
       of remembrance

              X.

       repotting the dying
       plant

       when it flowers,

       sleep
       comes to the hut

              XI.

       lullaby
       of an earthen jug:

       dawn
    

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