Category: 1940s

Categories
1940s African American Life and Death Poem

The Golden Garden Spider

The Golden Garden Spider

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Original 1940 woodcut for “The Golden Garden Spider,”
by Lois Mailou Jones. Public Domain.
The golden garden spider[1]
Has grasshoppers for lunch—
At least they hang beside her—
I’ve never seen her munch.
And yet they swing there every day,
And always in a different way.

Sometimes I glance at her at dawn,
But seldom find her food all gone.
It isn’t hard to tell you why—
She traps grasshoppers passing by,
The wraps them in her web all day.
When their long legs get caught they stay,
And kicking can’t do any good—
Somehow, sometimes—I wish it would.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “The Golden Garden Spider.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 13.

[1] Probably the Yellow Garden Spider, Argiope aurantia, which spins a circular web.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, whimsically enacts a natural history lesson, while it encourages children’s imagination.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Categories
1940s African American Birds Outdoors Poem

Scarlet Trimming

Scarlet Trimming

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Audubon, J. J. “Red-Headed Woodpecker.” Colored Print. In Birds of America (1827-38).
The woodpecker folk are quite fond of bright red—
Poinsettia scarlet for neck or for head.[1]
And whether the costume is brown, black or gray,
They count on red hats or red scarfs to make gay.
The dignified flicker, with linings of gold,[2]
The black and gray downy that weathers the cold,[3]
The jaunty old red-head in jockey outfit—[4]
All choose blurs of scarlet to cheer up a bit.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “Scarlet Trimming.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 77.

[1] Poinsettia are flowers native to Mexico that for many symbolize the Christmas holiday. Ordinarily red, they now come in many colors.

[2] The Northern Flicker is a large brown and gray woodpecker with a spotted breast and red hat. Coloration varies across the United States, where they are year-round residents.

[3] The Downy Woodpecker is a small bird that lives year-round in most of the United States. Only males have the characteristic red cap.

[4] Both female and male Red-Headed Woodpeckers have an entirely red head. Their bodies are white, and their wings are bright white and deep black. Now in decline in the U.S., they defend their home territory fiercely.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, whimsically enacts a natural history lesson, while it encourages children’s imagination.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Categories
1940s African American Poem Trees Wind

Wind-Stirred Trees

Wind-Stirred Trees

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Original 1940 woodcut for “Wind-Stirred Trees,”
by Lois Mailou Jones. Public Domain.
A tall, proud poplar’s like the ocean[1]
In tossing sound and wind-swept motion.
There’s nothing more like voice of sea
Than roaring billows of a tree,
And one things of the foam-fringed tide
As poplar leaves wave their white side.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “Wind-Stirred Trees.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 123.

[1] Numerous types of poplar trees appear across the United States. As Newsome notes, their leaves quiver in the wind, and many have white undersides. One of the most famous types is the quaking aspen.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, whimsically enacts a natural history lesson, while it encourages children’s imagination.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

“Fast-Growing Poplars Provide Solutions for Both Energy and Pollution Problems.” US Forest Service Northern Research Station 19 (Winter 2013).

Categories
1940s African American Humor Insects Outdoors Poem

In the Grass

In the Grass

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Original 1940 woodcut for “In the Grass,”
by Lois Mailou Jones. Public Domain.
Sometimes I lie in meadow grass,
And watch all kinds of insect pass
In brown and red and gray.
Some very busy ants speed by
With white crumb bundles stacked up high,
All hastening one way.

Each hurries with his heavy load 
Up what I call the Cricket Road,
It looks so cool and dark.
There’s pleasant millet growing there,[1]
And wisps of fox-grass everywhere[2]
That I use as a cane

To push along some lazy bug,
That lags without a load to lug
Along the insect land.
And bugs keep coming on and on—
New bands before the old have gone.
Sometimes one comes alone. 

A grasshopper quick, proud and lean
Leaps to the millet, tall and green,
And takes it for this throne. 
Sometimes a beetle blunders past
Or stops awhile, then starts out, fast,
As though he’d heard a call.

Sometimes a soft green worm drags by,
Then winds beneath a millet sky,
And can’t be seen at all.
Each worm and bug moves on its way.
Some tap the grass, as though in play.
But I like best the ants’ long strong
Returning from their marketing.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “In the Grass.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 9-10.

[1] Millet is an ancient type of grass often grown for its grain. Newsome imagines herself down in the grass with the insects, so the millet seems like a forest.

[2] Foxtail grasses, considered a weed, can reach as much as three feet tall. The seeds are dangerous for livestock to eat.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, whimsically enacts a natural history lesson, while it encourages children’s imagination.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Categories
1940s African American Flowers Poem

Indian Pipe

Indian Pipe

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Original 1940 woodcut for “Indian Pipe,”
by Lois Mailou Jones. Public Domain.
The Indian pipe folk stand around[1]
With white pajamas on,
And look so lazy in the gloom,
I almost hear them yawn.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “Indian Pipe.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 105.
Cover of Emily Dickinson’s Poems, 1890. Public Domain.

[1] Often known as the “ghost plant,” the Indian pipe is nearly transparent. It emerges, sometimes suddenly, from forest floors in early summer to early autumn. Emily Dickinson admired the plant; see Dubrow’s blog below.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, focuses on nature’s power to spark children’s imagination. It may respond to one of two Emily Dickinson poems, “White as an Indian Pipe” or “’Tis whiter than an Indian Pipe.”

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Painting of Indian pipe by Mabel Loomis Todd given to
Emily Dickinson, date unknown. Courtesy Amherst College.
Categories
1940s African American Outdoors Poem Stars, Moon, Sky

I Like to Hear the Wind

I Like to Hear the Wind

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Original 1940 woodcut for “I Like the Wind,”
by Lois Mailou Jones. Public Domain.
I like to hear the wind at night
Running along with all its might,
Over the roof and over my head,
Way up above my cozy bed.

I like to hear the wind by day,
Calling out in such a jolly way,
Making my hat go sailing out,
Slapping my coat and hair about.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “I Like to Hear the Wind.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 160.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, focuses on nature’s power to spark children’s imagination.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Categories
1940s African American Poem Stars, Moon, Sky Wild animals

Sky Pictures

Sky Pictures

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Original 1940 woodcut for “Sky Pictures,”
by Lois Mailou Jones. Public Domain.
Sometimes a great white mountain
Or snowy polar bear
Or lazy little flocks of sheep
Move on in the blue air.

The mountains tear themselves like floss,[1]
The bears all melt away,
The little sheep will drift apart
As though they’d finished play.

And then new sheep and mountains come, 
New polar bears appear,
And roll and tumble on again
Up in the skies, blue-clear.

The polar bears would like to get 
Where polar bears belong.
The mountains try so hard to stand
In one place, firm and strong.

The little sheep all want to stop
And pasture in the sky.
But never can these things be done,
Although they try and try.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “Sky Pictures.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 143.

[1] Today many readers might think of dental floss, but here floss refers to a soft thread of silk or cotton used for embroidery.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, focuses on nature’s power to spark children’s imagination.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Categories
1940s African American Poem Seasons Trees

Quilting Bee

Quilting Bee

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Modern pieced fabric quilt. Courtesy QuiltWoman.com.
Sometimes I play that in the spring
The woods get scalloped scraps of green,
And set the trees to gay quilting,[1]
Making a merry, gorgeous scene,
A sight I like to look up to—
The sky helps piece the quilt with blue.

Then there’s a change when autumn’s back,
The green scraps turn to gold and red.
The dark twigs stitch them still with black,
But there’re more blue scraps overhead,
And soon the whole quilt’s all blue-gray—
The brighter scraps get blown away.

And now I play each empty tree
Is left there from the quilting bee.
They can’t get home—so bent and old
Out there with bare hands in the cold
To wait for spring and gay green scraps
To fill their old lean hands and laps.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “Quilting Bee.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 125.

[1] A quilting bee is a traditional community activity where a group of people gather to sew together squares (or other pieces) of fabric to form a quilt. The bee would also help sew together the top (pieced) section, a filling (such as a sheet of cotton batting), and a backing fabric. Newsome imagines the sky and trees as pieces in a quilt that her poem stitches together. Unlike a cloth quilt, nature’s “quilt” changes as the seasons change.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, uses the community activity of quilting to teach a natural history lesson.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

One of the best-known quilting groups today is the community of Gee’s Bend, Alabama.

Contemporary fabric quilt. Artist Unknown.
Categories
1940s African American Birds Poem

Chimney Swift Runaway

Chimney Swift Runaway

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
Print of chimney swift (top) and barn swallow, 19th century. Public Domain.
He looked like a closed umbrella[1]
Some fairy elf had swung
With the little end turned upward—
That was the way he hung,
Clasping my curtains with all his might,
Quivering like ferns in his funny fright.

He’d dropped from his chimney nursery,
And tried to fly through
My tin kitchen flue.[2]
I heard his wings lash,
And, quick as a flash,
I pulled off the tin
And let him fly in.

The new scenes made him quite uncertain,
That’s why he held fast to the curtain
Till I’d unhooked his claws with care
And turned him free to take the air.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “Chimney Swift Runaway.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 80.

[1] Chimney swifts are small birds that nest on vertical surfaces like chimneys and flues. Federally protected, they are famous fliers and often chatter when they are aloft. They travel thousands of miles from their winter homes in Peru to breed in North America during the summer.

[2] A flue takes stove exhaust from the house.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, whimsically enacts a natural history lesson and speaks to animal welfare.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

Photo of Chimney swifts hanging on chimney. Public Domain.
Categories
1940s African American Farm life Food Harvest Poem

In the Market

In the Market

By Effie Lee Newsome
Annotations by Karen Kilcup
French botanical print, 19thC. Public Domain.
When vegetables go to the market in town
They wear the most wonderful frills on their frocks—
Broccoli and lettuce and gay Brussels sprouts
And plump country turnips in bright purple socks.

The cabbage comes wrapped in a satiny shawl,
The carrots in tight orange skirts,
Tomatoes all grinning like red country girls,
And parsley so fancy in little green curls,
Cucumbers with warts on each long, smileless face
That seems quite displeased with the town,
And beets very shabby with dull sweaters on,
Limp skirts with red streaks up and down.
Newsome, Effie Lee. “In the Market.” Gladiola Garden: Poems of Outdoors and Indoors for Second Grade Readers. Washington, DC: Associated Publishers, 1940, 61.

Contexts

Newsome worked among the many celebrated writers of the Harlem Renaissance, who included Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, James Weldon Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, and Anne Spencer, many of them poets. Among her noteworthy contributions to that movement was her writing and editing for W. E. B. Du Bois’s magazine, The Crisis, the official publication of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). As John Claborn points out, Du Bois’s political goals embraced the idea of access to natural spaces, and the magazine featured environmental writing by such notable authors as Arna Bontemps, Claude McKay, and Hughes. Newsome contributed to and edited “The Little Page” (“Whimsies for the Younger Folk”), where much of her work emphasized nature. This poem, like many others in The Envious Lobster, whimsically enacts a natural history lesson.

Resources for Further Study
Contemporary Connections

Anonymous. Reading of Newsome’s poem, “The Bronze Legacy.” The illustrations for Gladiola Garden were done by prominent Black artist Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998).

Johnston, Amber O’Neal. “African American Poetry: Effie Lee Newsome. Heritage Mom blog.

css.php