Page 26 - Contrast1990

The white man wrenches the runt away from its mother.
''Where's your papa, little bastard?" The boy cries in fear.
A mother's heart is broken.
She lunges fiercely in protection
And is greeted by the backside of a white hand on her jaw.

"Black bitch!" he slanders, his power shaken by her rush.
Mammy gathers in the children
And the white man mounts his throne.
The black knotty heads press into her thighs
As the dust from the horse coats her white apron.

Pick up the pieces, Mammy, from your broken china cup.
And send the children to play with the crudely whittled animals.
But where are your tears, Mammy? Where are your tears?
No tears, honey, I cried too many 'fore.
I 'spect I seen it comin' this time.

Corn pone's burning in the skillet and the kettle's boiling over.
Mammy's still collecting pieces from the broken china cup
Thinking Jacob'll glue them back together,
Good as new,
Like in the big house.

But Jacob doesn't come home before dark tonight-
None of the niggers do.
Except Lazy Boy, who comes running up to the slant porch
Banging on the door, terrified, screaming
"Mammy, Mammy, Jacob's done been whupped!"

And Mammy gathers up the lin ament,
Tears her best sheet into strips
To ease poor Jacob's pain
When the neighbors haul him home
On the back of his broken-down mule.

Jacob is a good man, a good black man.
He wouldn't stir up trouble with The Master's daughter
Her fair white skin, smooth and perfumed
Wouldn't be as nice as Mammy's fattened arms
And sturdy back on a cold night.

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