Herein
the longing of black men must have respect: the rich and
bitter depth of their experience, the unknown treasures of
their inner life, the strange rendings of nature they have seen,
may give the world new points of view and make their
loving, living, and doing precious to all human hearts. And to
themselves in these the days that try their souls, the chance to
soar in the dim blue air above the smoke is to their finer
spirits boon and guerdon for what they lose on earth by being
black.
I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not. Across the color
line I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where
smiling men and welcoming women glide in gilded halls.
From out the caves of evening that swing between the strong-
limbed earth and the tracery of the stars, I summon Aristotle
and Aurelius and what soul I will, and they come all gra-
ciously with no scorn nor condescension. So, wed with Truth,
I dwell above the Veil. Is this the life you grudge us, O
knightly America? Is this the life you long to change into the
dull red hideousness of Georgia? Are you so afraid lest
peering from this high Pisgah, between Philistine and
Amalekite, we sight the Promised Land?
VII
Of the Black Belt
I am black but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem,
As the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon.
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