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A slave is enslaved / Can be enslaved by unwisdom 

Can be re-enslaved while in flight from the enemy

Can be enslaved by his brother whom he loves

 
 

 

Speak the Truth to the People

By Mari Evans

Hearing the truth can free the mind so people can concentrate on constructive work. This poem admonishes blacks to be truthful in speech so audiences can "identify the enemy," distance themselves from conventions that enslave African Americans, and build a strong black nation with its own ideals.

 

Speak the truth to the people

Talk sense to the people

Free them with honesty

Free the people with Love and Courage for their Being

Spare them the fantasy

Fantasy enslaves

A slave is enslaved

Can be enslaved by unwisdom

Can be re-enslaved while in flight from the enemy

Can be enslaved by his brother whom he loves

His brother whom he trusts whom he loves

His brother whom he trusts

His brother with the loud voice

And the unwisdom

Speak the truth to the people

It is not necessary to green the heart

Only to identify the enemy

It is not necessary to blow the mind

Only to free the mind

To identify the enemy is to free the mind

A free mind has no need to scream

A free mind is ready for other things

To BUILD black schools

To BUILD black children

To BUILD black minds

To BUILD black love

To BUILD black impregnability

To BUILD a strong black nation

To BUILD

Speak the truth to the people

Spare them the opium of devil-hate

They need no trips on honky-chants.

Move them instead to a BLACK ONENESS.

A black strength which will defend its own

Needing no cacophony of screams for activation

A black strength which will attack the laws

exposes the lies, disassembles the structure

and ravages the very foundation of evil.

Speak the truth to the people

To identify the enemy is to free the mind

Free the mind of the people

Speak to the mind of the people

Speak Truth

*   *   *   *   *

posted 7 April 2006

 

 
 

Mari Evans Bio

Personal

Born 16 July 1923 in Toledo , Ohio

Attended the University of Toledo

Lives in Indianapolis, Indiana

Like any good People's Poet, Evans is a sharp observer and an honest person. . . .  Just as fortunately for us, she is careful that all she does tell is the truth. The whole truth, the poetic truth. The truth for, about and to the people.”  -- Maya Angelou

Professional

Served as the Distinguished Writer and Assistant Professor of the African American and Resource Center at Cornell University

Taught at Indiana University, the State University of New York at Albany, the University of Miami at Coral Gables and at Spelman College, Atlanta

Publications:


Books of Poetry

A Dark and Splendid Mass (Harlem River Press, 1992)

Nightstar: 1973-1978 (1981)

I Am a Black Woman (1970)

Where Is All the Music? (1968)

Criticism

Black Women Writers (1950-1980): A Critical Evaluation (Contributor and Editor, 1984)

Books for Children

Dear Corinne, Tell Somebody! Love, Annie: A Book about Secrets (1999)

Singing Black: Alternative Nursery Rhymes for Children (1998, illustrated by Ramon Price)

Jim Flying High (1979, illustrated by Ashley Bryan)

Rap Stories (1974)

J.D. (1973, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney)

Plays

Eye (1979), an adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

River of My Song (1977)


Honors

Fellowships from the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, the National Endowment for the Arts, the John Hay Whitney Fellowship

Black Academy of Arts and Letters First Poetry Award (1975)

Zora Neale Hurston Society Award for Outstanding Contributions to Literature (1993), Alain Locke-Gwendolyn Brooks Award for Excellence in Literature (1995)

Celebrated with her photo on a Ugandan postage stamp (1997)

Inducted into Chicago State University's National Literary Hall of Fame for Writers of African Descent (1998)

Received an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Martin University (1999)

Other Sites: http://www.math.buffalo.edu/~sww/poetry/evans_mari.html

 

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