American Stuff
Work from the Federal Writers Project

All are Gay
Sterling Brown
Washington, D. C.

There should be laughing, tumbling,
Wild flinging about of thin arms and legs and bottoms.

'Tis summer, thc darkies are gay

They are: down on Decatur Street
Two kids climb cartons like Bojangles,
Tap, tap, ta-ta-tap--
Dancing for the pennies of the passers-by.

Let the picture be complete, with all of its fixings:
The jigs, the singing, and the ceaseless play,
The perpetual wide-mouthed smiles.

And: in the paved alleys behind the wealthy homes,
The foragers dart thin wrists in glittering garbage-pails,
Find heels of soggy bread, and unstripped chops,
Topping off the feast with rinds of grapefruit
Or rattlesnake melons snitched from market piles,
With practiced looks thrown swiftly over their shoulders
For their arch-enemies, the cops.

Underneath the Georgia moon . . .

M' ole man is on de chaingang
Muh mammy's on relief

Down at the Lincoln Theater, little Abe is set free again.
Hears music that gets deep down, into his soul.
"Callin' all cars, callin' all cars," and the prolonged hiss,
"Black Ace. Black Ace." And his thin voice screams
When the tommy guns drill, and the bodies fall,
Mow them down, mow them down, gangsters or G-men,
So long as the folks get killt, no difference at all,
So long as the rattling gun-fire plays little Abe his song.

And the only pleasure exceeding this
Will come when he gets hold of the pearl-handled gat
Waiting for him, ready, in Moe Epstein's.

Gonna be the Black Ace hisself before the time ain't long.

Outside the theater he stalks his pa'dner,
Creeps up behind him, cocks his thumb,
Rams his forefinger against his side.
"Stick 'em up, dam yuh," his treble whines.

The squeals and the flight
Are more than he looked for, his laughter peals,
He is just at the bursting point with delight.
"Black Ace. Stick 'em up, feller.... I'm the Black Ace."

Oh, to grow up soon, to the top of glory,
With a glistening furrow on his dark face,
Badge of his manhood, pass-key to fame.
"Before the time ain't long," he says.
"Lord, before the time ain't long."

The young folks roll in the cabins on the floor

And in the narrow unlighted streets,
Behind the shrouding vines and lattices,
Up the black foul alleys, the unpaved roads,
Sallie Lou and Johnnie Mae play the spies,
Ready, giggling, for experiments, for their unformed bodies
To be roughly clasped, for little wild cries,
For words learned of their elders on display:
"Gonna get me a boy friend," Sallie Lou says;
"Got me a man already," brags Johnnie Mae.

This is the schooling ungrudged by the state.
Short in time, as usual, but fashioned to last.
The scholars are apt, and never play truant.
The stockade is waiting.... And they will not be late.

Before, before the time ain't very long.

In the stockade: "Little boy, how come you hyeah?"
"Little bitty gal, how old are you?"
"Well, I got hyeah, didn't I? Whatchu keer?"
"I'm goin' on twelve years old."

Say of them: "Like Topsy, they just grew."