Picture courtesy of Pixabay

This poem is inspired by Gwendolyn Brooks (1917 - 2000)

I have done two in her style today, but decided there would be two separate posts, as they are vastly different in style.

Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks was an African-American poet. She was appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968 and Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1985.

Legacy and Honors

1968, appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois.
1985, selected as the Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, an honorary one-year position whose title changed the next year to Poet Laureate.
1988, inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.
1994, chosen as the National Endowment for the Humanities' Jefferson Lecturer, one of the highest honors in American literature and the highest award in the humanities given by the federal government.
1995, presented with the National Medal of Arts.
1995, honored as the first Woman of the Year chosen by the Harvard Black Men's Forum.
Other awards she received included the Frost Medal, the Shelley Memorial Award, and an award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Brooks also received more than seventy-five honorary degrees from colleges and universities worldwide.
Brooks died at age 83 on December 3, 2000, at her Southside Chicago home. She is buried at Lincoln Cemetery in Blue Island, Illinois.

The poem that inspired mine...

The Crazy Woman
By Gwendolyn Brooks

I shall not sing a May song.
A May song should be gay.
I'll wait until November
And sing a song of gray.

I'll wait until November
That is the time for me.
I'll go out in the frosty dark
And sing most terribly.

And all the little people
Will stare at me and say,
"That is the Crazy Woman
Who would not sing in May."

(Biography info and poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks courtesy of PoemHunter.com)

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