Selected Poems

Dubbed the "Poet Laureate of the Negro race" by Booker T. Washington, Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906) is best known for his lively dialect poems. In addition to his dialect verse, however, Dunbar also wrote fine poems in standard English that captured many elements of the black experience in America.
This volume contains a representative cross-section of both types of verse, including "Ode to Ethiopia," "Worn Out," "Not They Who Soar," "When Malindy Sings," "We Wear the Mask," "Little Brown Baby," "Dinah Kneading Dough," "The Haunted Oak," "Black Samson of Brandywine" and many more.
A rich amalgam of lyrics encompassing patriotism, a celebration of rural life and homey pleasures, anger at the inequalities accorded his race, and faith in ultimate justice, this collection affords readers an excellent opportunity to enjoy the distinctive voice and poetic technique of one of the most beloved and widely read African-American poets.

Ere Sleep Comes Down to Soothe the Weary Eyes
Accountability
Life
An Ante-Bellum Sermon
Ode to Ethiopia
The Mystery
Not They Who Soar
A Banjo Song
Unexpressed
Song of Summer
Religion
The Colored Soldiers
When De Co'n Pone's Hot
Discovered
A Summer's Night
Ships That Pass in the Night
We Wear the Mask
A Negro Love Song
If
Signs of the Times
Why Fades a Dream?
When Malindy Sings
The Party
Her Thought and His
The Right to Die
Behind the Arras
A Hymn
Sympathy
Little Brown Baby
Lover's Lane
My Sort O'Man
A Death Song
Dely
A Letter
A Cabin Tale
How Lucy Backslid
Dinah Kneading Dough
The Poet
Black Samson of Brandywine
Douglass
Slow Through the Dark
Philosophy
On the Dedication of Dorothy Hall
To the South
The Haunted Oak
The Unsung Heroes
Resignation
Robert Gould Shaw
Life's Tragedy
Compensation
When Dey 'Listed Colored Soldiers
De Way T'ings Come
Temptation
A Plea
Chrismus on the Plantation
Theology
Li'l' Gal
The Old Cabin
Angelina
Weltschmerz
Misapprehension
A Plantation Melody
Possum
Parted
Right's Security
Worn Out
Silence
A Song