Baraka's SOS book is a large collection of poems- many of which revolve around aspects of black nationalism, racial injustice, and the sufferings faced by people of color. Several of the poems are depicted below, accompanied by analyses that unpack the content while exposing various interpretations laced in the writings.
THERE MUST BE A LONE RANGER!!!
****
but this also
is part of my charm.
that comes on
like terrible thoughts about death.
How dumb to be sentimental about anything
To cal it love
& cry pathetically
into the long black handkerchief
of the years.
"Look for you yesterday
Here you come today
Your mouth wide open
But what you got to say?"
-part of my charm
old envious blues feeling
ticking like a big cobblestone clock.
I hear the reel running out . . .
the spectators are impatient for popcorn:
It was only a selected short subject
F. Scott Charon
will soon be glad-handing me
like a legionaire
My silver bullets all gone
My black mask trampled in the dust
& Tonto way off in the hills
moaning like Bessie Smith.
Analysis:
This poem operates in an indirect manner, with phrases and words often hidden through metaphorical instances indicating a life of fear and anguish. Baraka describes an overwhelming nostalgia that accompanies his thoughts like a blanket of death cloaking him in the night. The first few lines can be understood as the constant terror a black man felt during that era- as though he was never safe. The lines "& cry pathetically /
into the long black handkerchief" embody the never-ending list of grievances many people are forced to suffer, while the public silently watches. The mention of popcorn in the poem develops a theatrical effect as if the world enjoys watching the racial injustice occurring as people of color worry for the limited time remaining in their lives before they're brutally hurt or killed.
A CONTRACT. (FOR THE DESTRUCTION AND
REBUILDING OF PATERSON
Flesh, and cars, tar, dug holes beneath stone
a rude hierarchy of money, band saws cross out
music, feeling. Even speech, corrodes.
I came here
from where I sat boiling in my veins, cold fear
at the death of men, the death of learning, in
cold fear, at my own. Romantic vests of same death
blank at the corner, blank when they raise their fingers
Criss the hearts, in dark flesh staggered so marvelous
are their lies. So complete, their mastery, of these
stupid niggers. Loud spics kill each other, and will not
make the simple trip to Tiffany's. Will not smash their
stainless
heads, against the simpler effrontery of so callous a code as gain.
You are no brothers, dirty woogies, dying under dried rinds,
in massa's
droopy tuxedos. Cab Calloways of the soul, at the soul's juncture, a
music, they think will save them from our eyes. (In the back of
the terminal
where the circus will not go. At the backs of crowds, stooped
and vulgar
breathing hate syllables, unintelligible rapes of all that linger in
our new world. Killed in white fedora hats, they stand so mute
at what
whiter slaves did to my father. They muster silence. They pray
at the
steps of abstract prisons, to be kings, when all is silence, when all
is stone. When even the stupid fruit of their loins is gold, or
something
else they cannot eat.
Analysis:
Baraka describes the opposing status of royalty and slavery as the trigger to destruction. The social class is developed through levels of segregation which prevent blacks from voicing their opinions; society thrives on the oppression and silence of others. The most striking element of this piece is Baraka's ability to convey emptiness and lost hope through the words. When I first read this poem, I felt the world of the speaker collapse around me. The poem itself is formatted in a way that reveals the staggering effects of a building, yet the lines are split apart as a physical representation of life shattering within seconds.
RHYTHM & BLUES (1
for Robert Williams, in exile
The symbols hang limply
in the street. A forest of objects,
motives,
black steaming christ
meat wood and cars
flesh light and stars
scream each new dawn for
whatever leaves pushed from gentle lips
fire shouted from the loins of history
immense dream of each silence grown to punctuation
against the grey flowers of the world.
I live against them, and hear them, and move
the way they move. Hanged against the night, so many
leaves, not even moving. The women scream tombs
and give the nights a dignity. For his heels
dragged on the brush. For his lips dry as brown wood. As
the simple motion of flesh whipping the air.
An incorrigible motive.
An action so secret it creates.
Men dancing on a beach.
Disappeared laughter erupting as the sea
erupts.
Controlled eyes seeing now all
there is
Ears that have grown
to hold their new maps
Enemies that grow
in silence. Empty white fingers
against the keys (a drunken foolish stupor
to kill these men
and scream "Economics," my God, "Economics"
for all the screaming women drunker still, laid out to rest
under the tables of nightclubs
under the thin trees of expensive forests
informed of nothing save the stink of their failure
the peacock insolence of zombie regimes
the diaphanous silence of empty churches
the mock solitude of a spastic's art.
"Love." My God, (after they
scream "Economics," these shabby personalities
the pederast anarchist chants against millions of
Elk-sundays in towns quieter than his. Lunches. Smells
the sidewalk invents, and the crystal music even dumb niggers
hate. They scream it down. They will not hear your jazz. Or
let me tell of the delicate colors of the flag, the graphic blouse
of the beautiful italian maiden. Afternoon spas
with telephone booths, Butterfingers, grayhaired anonymous
trustees.
dying with the afternoon. The people of my life
caressed with a silence that only they understand. Let their sons
make wild sounds of their mothers for your pleasure. Or
drive deep wedges in flesh / screaming birds of mourning, at
their own. The invisible mountains of New Jersey, linger
where I was born And the wind on that stone
2
Street of tinsel, and the jeweled dancers
of Belmont. Stone royalty they tear down
for new buildings where fags invent jellies.
A tub, a slick head, and the pink houses waving
at the night as it approaches. A dead fish truck
full of porters I ran track with, effeminate blues singers, the wealth
of the nation transposed into the ring of my flesh's image.
Grand dancers
spray noise and the disorder in these old tombs. Liverwurst
sandwiches dry
on brown fenced-in lawns, unfinished cathedrals tremble with
our screams.
Of the dozens, the razor, the cloth, the sheen, all speed adventure
locked
in my eyes. I give you now, to love me, if I spare what flesh of yours
is left. If I see past what I feel, and call music simply "Art" and will
not take it to its logical end. For the death by hanging, for
the death by the hooded political murderer, for the old man
dead in his
tired factory; election machines chime quietly his fraudulent faith.
For the well that marks the burned stores. For the deadly idiot
of compromise
who shrieks compassion, and bids me love my neighbor. Even
beyond the meaning
of such act as would give all my father's dead ash to fertilize
their bilious
land. Such act as would give me legend, "This is the man who
saved us
Spared us from the disappearance of the sixteenth note, the
destruction
of the scale. This is the man who against the black pits of
despairing genius
cried, "Save the Popular Song." For them who pat me in the
huddle and do not
argue at the plays. For them who finish second and are happy
they are Chinese,
and need not run those 13 blocks.
I am not moved. I will not move to save them. There is no
"melody." Only the foot stomped, the roaring harmonies of
need. The
hand banged on the table, waved in the air. The teeth pushed
against
the lip. The face and fingers sweating. "Let me alone," is
praise enough
for these musicians.
3
My own mode of conscience. And guilt, always the obvious
connection.
They spread you in the sun, and leave you there, one of a
kind, who
has no sons to tell this to. The mind so bloated at its own
judgment. The
railing consequence of energy given in silence. Ideas whose
sole place
is where they form. The language less than the act. The act so
far beyond
itself, meaning all forms, all modes, all voices, chanting for safety.
I am deaf and blind and lost and still not again sing your
quiet verse. I have lost
even the act of poetry, and writhe now for cool horizonless
dawn. The
shake and chant, bulled electric motion, figure of what there
will be
as it sits beside me waiting to live past my own meekness. My own
light skin. Bull of yellow perfection, imperfectly made,
imperfectly
understood, except as it rises against the mountains, like sun
but brighter, like flame but hotter. There will be those
who will tell you it will be beautiful.
Analysis:
"RHYTHM & BLUES (1" has a narrative front that reaches readers in an approachable manner. This poem is more soft-spoken, and carries caution for abrupt or harsh attitude, similar to what the title suggests. In a wave of calm, Baraka attacks aspects of racial injustice and exposes how he managed to remain alive during a time that almost destroyed him. Baraka describes "Controlled eyes seeing" that seemed to follow black people at all times, waiting for the exact moment when they would make a mistake and could be held with charge for that "crime." The notion of silence was deemed necessary to survive- as if words alone could cause the deaths of many. Beautiful was defined within one parameter, and colored people were drilled with the knowledge that they will never fall into such criteria. Baraka admits he may be "deaf and blind" like society claims, but he continues to wait for that scorching moment when the sun will rise "like flame but hotter" amongst the mountains: the time of revolution, when blacks will take back their stolen souls and beaten memories and let their children learn that they are capable of love and being beautiful just like any other human in this world.
BLACK ART
Poems are bullshit unless they are
teeth or trees or lemons piled
on a step. Or black ladies dying
of men leaving nickel hearts
beating them down. Fuck poems
and they are useful, wd they shoot
come at you, love what you are,
breathe like wrestlers, or shudder
strangely after pissing. We want live
words of the hip world live flesh &
coursing blood. Hearts Brains
Souls splintering fire. We want poems
like fists beating niggers out of Jocks
or dagger poems in the slimy bellies
of the owner-jews. Black poems to
snear on girdlemamma mulatto bitches
whose brains are red jelly stuck
between 'lizabeth taylor's toes. Stinking
Whores! We want "poems that kill."
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
with tongues pulled out and sent to Ireland. Knockoff
poems for dope selling wops or slick halfwhite
politicians Airplane poems, rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuh
. . . rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . Setting fire and death to
whities ass. Look at the Liberal
Spokesman for the jews clutch his throat
& puke himself into eternity . . . rrrrrrrr
There's a negroleader pinned to
a bar stool in Sardi's eyeballs melting
in hot flame Another negroleader
on the steps of the white house one
kneeling between the sheriff's thighs
negotiating cooly got his people.
Agggh . . . stumbles across the room . . .
Put it on him, poem. Strip him naked
to the world! Another bad poem cracking
steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth
Poem scream poison gas on beasts in green berets
Clean out the world for virtue and love,
Let there be no love poems written
until love can exist freely and
cleanly. Let Black People understand
that they are lovers and the sons
of lovers and warriors and sons
of warriors Are poems & poets &
all the loveliness here in the world
We want a black poem, And a
Black World.
Let the world be a Black Poem
And Let All Black People Speak This Poem
Silently
or LOUD
Analysis:
"Black Art" is a collection of sounds and voices escaping from behind the framework of words. Reading this poem felt as though Baraka's lyrical voice were drifting into my ears. This piece emphasizes the importance of poems having messages. The writings should reflect reality, including the hate and violence which this world is created from. Baraka conveys how his writings are "Assassin poems, Poems that shoot / guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys" and often become too extreme for the public to hear. But they encompass nothing but the truth- nothing except the cruel and violent lives black people are forced to live and embrace, while everyone else turns their back and leaves with a blind eye.
WHEN WE'LL WORSHIP JESUS
We'll worship Jesus
When jesus do
Somethin
When jesus blow up
the white house
or blast nixon down
when jesus turn out congress
or bust general motors to
yard bird motors
jesus we'll worship jesus
when jesus get down
when jesus get out his yellow lincoln
w/ the built in cross stain glass
window & box w/ black peoples
enemies we'll worship jesus when
he get bad enough to at least scare
somebody- cops not afraid
of jesus
pushers not afraid
of jesus, capitalists racists
imperialists not afriad
of jesus shit they makin money
off jesus
we'll worship jesus when mao
do, when toure does
when the cross replaces Nkrumah's
star
Jesus need to hurt some a our
enemies, then we'll check him
out, all that screaming and hollering
& wallering and moaning talkin bout
jesus, jesus, in a red
check velevet vine + 8 in. heels
jesus pinky finger
got a goose egg ruby
which actual bleeds
jesus at the apollo
doin splits and helpin
nixon trick niggers
jesus w/ his one eyed self
tongue kissing johnny carson
up the behind
jesus need to be busted
jesus need to be thrown down and whipped
till something better happen
jesus aint did nothin for us
but kept us turned toward the
sky (him and his boy allah
too, need to be checkd
out!)
we'll worship jesus
when he get a boat load of ak-47s
and some dynamite
and blow up abernathy robotin
for gulf
jesus need to be busted
we ain't gonna worship nobody
but niggers gettin up off
the ground
not gon worship jesus
unless he just a tricked up
nigger somebody named
outside his race
need to worship yo self fo
you worship jesus
need to bust jesus (+ check
out his spooky brother
alla while you heavy
on the case
cause we ain gon worship jesus
we aint gon worship
jesus
we aint gon worship
jesus
not till he do somethin
not till he help us
not till the world get changed
and he ain, jesus ain, he cant change the world
we can change the world
we can struggle against our forces of backwardness, we can
change the world
we can struggle against our selves, our slowness, our
connection with
the oppressor, the very cultural aggression which binds us to
our enemies
as their slaves
we can change the world
we aint gonna worship jesus cause jesus dont exist
xcept in song and story except in ritual and dance, except in
slum stained
tears or trillion dollar opulence stretching back in history, the
history
of the oppression of the human mind
we worship the strength in us
we worship ourselves
we worship the light in us
we worship the warmth in us
we worship the wrold
we worship the love in us
we worship our selves
we worship nature
we worship our selves
we worship the life in us, and science, and knowledge, and
transformation
of the visible world
but we aint gona worship no jesus
we aint gonna legitimize the witches and devils and spooks
and hobgoblins
the sensuous lies of the rulers to keep us cjained to fantasy
and illusion
sing about life, not jesus
sing about revolution, not no jesus
stop singing about jesus,
sing about, creation, our creation, the life of the world and
fantastic
nature how we struggle to transform it, but dont victimize our
selves by
distorting the world
stop moaning about jesus, stop sweatin and crying and stompin
and dyin for jesus
unless thats the name of the army we building to force the
land finally to
change hands. And lets not call that jesus, get a quick
consensus, on that,
lets damn sure not call that black fire muscle
no invisible psychic dungeon
no gentle vision strait jacket, lets call that peoples army, or
wapendtizi or
simba
wachanga, but we not gon call it jesus, and not gon worship
jesus, throw
jesus out yr mind. Build the new world out of reality, and new
vision
we come to find out that there is of the world
to understand what there is here in the world!
to visualize change, and force it.
we worship revolution
Analysis:
This piece delivered a strong surge of emotions to readers. The words were filled with such anger and disappointment that the speaker seemed to lose all hope in humanity and Jesus. Religion is portrayed as a lost cause and incapable of worship. The poem constantly echoes phrases of change for a new approach: "sing about revolution, not no jesus." Revolution is portrayed as the only chance for survival and freedom. The turn towards revolution within the poem holds such power and a sense of urgency, as though Baraka was running out of time. These lines come together to convince readers of the importance of revolution, as preached by Baraka through his black nationalism movement.
*segments of poem indicated by line numbers
IN THE TRADITION
*lines 118 -137
What is this tradition Basied on, we Blue Black Wards
strugglin
against a Big White Fog, Africa people, our fingerprints are
everywhere
on you america, our fingerprints are everywhere, Cesaire told
you
that, our families strewn around the world has made more parts of
that world
blue and funky, cooler, flashier, hotter, afro-cuban james
brownier
a wide panafrican
world
Tho we are afro-americans, african americans
let the geographic history of our flaming hatchet motion
hot ax motion
hammer & hatchet
our cotton history
our rum & indigo
sugar cane
history
*lines 165-169
But just as you rise up to gloat I scream COLTRANE! STEVIE
WONDER!
MALCOLM X!
ALBERT AYLER!
THE BLACK ARTS!
*line 248 (last)
DEATH TO THE KLAN!
Analysis:
The first section of lines (118 - 137) is a dedication to the hard work of African Americans. Many parts of the nation was built by black individuals- through their hard work, blood shedding, and tears dripping all day and night. One of the many efforts Baraka worked towards in the black nationalism movement was achieving equality and acknowledgment. There is no doubt how much work black people have done to build this nation, yet the media and society hides the black roots, often claiming they never really existed. Lines 165 - 169 has the name of activists spelled in capital letters that scream revolution. Like many of his other poems, Baraka includes the strong message of revolution to readers as a method of indicating the severity and urgency of the matter, and how important it is to act for the black nationalism movement today. I chose to include the last line of the poem due to the hatred and need for justice that resonates through the ending. "DEATH TO THE KLAN" portrays a violent side of black nationalism, but also displays how necessary it is to rid the world of white supremacists and those who belittle and torture others to gain more power.