Sonia Sanchez

To Anita

high/yellow/black/girl
walken like the sun u be.
move on even higher.
         those who
laugh at yo/color
         have not moved
to the blackness we be about
cuz as Curtis Mayfield be sayen
we people be darker than blue
         and quite a few
of us be yellow
         all soul/shades of
blackness.
         yeah. high/yellow/black/girl
     walk yo/black/song
       cuz some of us
         be hearen yo/sweet/music.

Sonia Sanchez was born Wilsonia Benita Driver on September 9, 1934 in Birmingham, Alabama. Her mother died when she was a baby and she lived with various relatives, including her grandmother who died when Sanchez was six. She then went to live with her father and stepmother in Harlem, and began writing poetry as a young child. She attended New York City public schools and earned a BA in Political Science from Hunter College in 1955. She then did graduate work at NYU, studying writing under Louise Bogan.

Sanchez became part of the Black Arts Movement along with poets Amiri Baraka and Larry Neal. She was also in a writers' group affiliated with Broadside Press that included Nikki Giovanni, Haki R. Madhubuti and Etheridge Knight. She married Knight but the couple divorced in 1972. She had previously been married to Albert Sanchez, a Puerto Rican immigrant.

Sanchez moved to California in the mid-sixties, and taught at San Francisco State University from 1967 to 1969, where she was instrumental in creating a department of Black Studies. Returning to the east coast, she taught at the University of Pittsburgh where she created the first course on black women and literature in the United States. In 1977 she became a professor of English and Women's Studies at Temple University, a position she held until her retirement in 1999.

Sanchez's first published book of poetry was Homecoming in 1969, followed by We a BaddDDD People in 1970. Another, Homegirls and Hand Grenades, won the American Book Award in 1985. Much of her work is written in urban Black English, with deliberate misspellings and a creative use of punctuation and layout similar that that of e e cummings. She has written a total of 13 books of poetry, along with six plays and three children's books. She has recorded much of her work and is known for the jazz-like feel of her readings.

A Love Poem Written for Sterling Brown

              (after reading a New York Times article re
              a mummy kept preserved for about 300 years)

I'm gonna get me some mummy tape for your love
preserve it for 3000 years or more
I'm gonna let the world see you
tapping a blue shell dance of love
I'm gonna ride your love bareback
on totem poles
bear your image on mountains
turning in ocean sleep
string your sighs thru the rainbow
of old age.
In the midst of desert people and times
I'm gonna fly your red/eagle/laughter 'cross the sky.

Ballad
(after the spanish)

forgive me if i laugh
you are so sure of love
you are so young
and i too old to learn of love.

the rain exploding
in the air is love
the grass excreting her
green wax is love
and stones remembering
past steps is love,
but you. you are too young
for love
and i too old.

once. what does it matter
when or who, i knew
of love.
i fixed my body
under his and went
to sleep in love
all trace of me
was wiped away

forgive me if i smile
young heiress of a naked dream
you are so young
and i too old to learn of love.

A Love Poem Written for Sterling Brown

              (after reading a New York Times article re 

              a mummy kept preserved for about 300 years) 

I'm gonna get me some mummy tape for your love 

preserve it for 3000 years or more 

I'm gonna let the world see you 

tapping a blue shell dance of love 

I'm gonna ride your love bareback 

on totem poles 

bear your image on mountains 

turning in ocean sleep 

string your sighs thru the rainbow 

of old age. 

In the midst of desert people and times 

I'm gonna fly your red/eagle/laughter 'cross the sky. 

Ballad  

by Sonia Sanchez

     (after the spanish)

forgive me if i laugh 

you are so sure of love 

you are so young 

and i too old to learn of love.

the rain exploding 

in the air is love 

the grass excreting her 

green wax is love 

and stones remembering 

past steps is love, 

but you. you are too young 

for love 

and i too old.

once. what does it matter 

when or who, i knew 

of love. 

i fixed my body 

under his and went 

to sleep in love 

all trace of me 

was wiped away

forgive me if i smile 

young heiress of a naked dream 

you are so young 

and i too old to learn of love.