It’s a Long Way
By William Stanley Braithwaite
Annotations by Rene Marzuk
It’s a long way the sea-winds blow
Over the sea-plains blue,—
But longer far has my heart to go
Before its dreams come true.
It’s work we must, and love we must,
And do the best we may,
And take the hope of dreams in trust
To keep us day by day.
It’s a long way the sea-winds blow—
But somewhere lies a shore—
Thus down the tide of Time shall flow
My dreams forevermore.
BRAITHWAITE, WILLIAM STANLEY. “IT’S A LONG WAY,” IN THE UPWARD PATH: A READER FOR COLORED CHILDREN, ED. MYRON T. PRITCHARD AND MARY WHITE OVINGTON, 181-82. NEW YORK: HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, 1920.
Contexts
Braithwaite’s poem was included in The Upward Path: A Reader for Colored Children, published in 1920 and compiled by Myron T. Pritchard and Mary White Ovington. The volume’s foreword states that, “to the present time, there has been no collection of stories and poems by Negro writers, which colored children could read with interest and pleasure and in which they could find a mirror of the traditions and aspirations of their race.”
Resources for Further Study
- Find other poems by William Stanley Braithwaite at Poets.org.
