His voice is low, deliberate . . . the tones firm and even . . . he drops wearily to the floor with his hands in an attitude of prayer before him.
"And yet, Lord, with my weakness there is strength for who but I could carry these bonds and still exist?I have given America loyalty unequalled in man's history.From the loins of my brown women, sons have come forth to fight and die for a democracy that may lynch the survivors.I have planted seed deep in the womb of the good earth and reaped only cotton . . . and mobs . . . and peonage.I am the public martyr for America's arena . . . I gave Crispus Attucks at the Boston Tea Party and today I am handed Scottsboro, in Alabama.My country's papers give me front page headlines for my murderers and one paragraph beside the want ad section for my men of letters and science."God the Father" and "Love thy Neighbor" shout my white brothers in Christ from behind the doors of their gaudy churches slammed shut and locked when I seek to enterWriters sling buckets of ink to show the skin You gave me proves inferiority . . . purses bulge with cash exchanged for the mass privilege of systematic hate.In courts down South I am fodder for chaingang and electric chair since any white convict has more say-so than my Doctors of Philosophy
