He wrote I, Too to illustrate the ostracisation he faced throughout his life, feeling as though he were constantly being pushed to the outer edges of society, a society run by the white majority. Nobody’ll dare Say to me, “Eat in the kitchen,” Then.īesides, They’ll see how beautiful I am And be ashamed-īorn in 1902, Langston Hughes was an African American poet, social activist, novelist, and playwright. Tomorrow, I’ll be at the table When company comes. They send me to eat in the kitchen When company comes, But I laugh, And eat well, And grow strong. She also makes clever references to popular, thought-provoking movies about racism, like Get Out, The Help, and Hidden Figures, which all emotively touch on the injustice that people of colour have faced generation after generation. Challenging the normalised ideas of what it means to be black, Amy uses excerpts from a song by Billie Holiday called ‘Strange Fruit’, originally written by Abel Meeropol in 1939 to protest against lynchings in America. So how dare you? How dare you put me down! Question my ethnicity, I’m still a shade of brown And I’m sorry if I don’t live up to your ‘black norms’ But I live in a world with segregated dorms Society crushes me, tells me I’m ugly But copies my features, they must think it’s funny I’m not trying to in any way be mean But I live in a society covered in white sheen Sorry to Bother You, but I should Get Out ’Cause The Hate U Give leaves me with no doubt That I am not The Help, the help that you need But the Hidden Figures are clear to see That I should stop trying to be ‘Black’ and just try to be MeĪ top 15 winner of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2019, Amy Saunders was only 13 years old when she wrote You’re Not Black, a poem that conveys the internal struggle of being a black person that feels like they’re on the outside of their culture looking in. I don’t recognise the Caribbean music, or the Afrobeats I only know of Liszt, Chopin and Ludovico Einaudi Whose names you’ve probably never heard “You’re not black, if you don’t know this beat” Yet, I am familiar with the beat of pounding Pounding of sugar cane, the whipping of backs The cries and screams of my ancestors Ring loud in my head centuries later

I sit with them at lunch Fried chicken on my plate I eat with a knife and fork “You’re not black, if you don’t use your hands to eat” Yet I know that hands tied up the strange fruit on the trees in the south The fruit for the crows to pluck For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop* We’ve curated a list of incredibly powerful poems that depict both the internal and external struggles of being a person of colour, from 1926 to today, with hopes that they will inspire, uplift, and stir people to action.

With many veterans of activism telling tales of civil rights protests that date back to our grandparents’ generation, it’s clear that there’s a serious need for systemic change in the world’s approach to racism – and it needed to happen yesterday. From Langston Hughes to Warsan Shire, here are 7 moving poems about the trials of racial discrimination and injustice, written by poets of colour.Īs mainstream media begins to slacken its coverage of the Black Lives Matter protests that are taking place across the world, the movement continues to rage as people of colour demand that their stories be heard.

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