Selected Poems Quotes

“We real cool. We
Left school. We

Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We

Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We

Jazz June. We
Die soon.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“Say to them,
say to the down-keepers,
the sun-slappers,
the self-soilers,
the harmony-hushers,
"Even if you are not ready for day
it cannot always be night."
You will be right.
For that is the hard home-run.

Live not for battles won.
Live not for the-end-of-the-song.
Live in the along.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“ To be in love
Is to touch things with a lighter hand.

In yourself you stretch, you are well.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“my dreams, my works, must wait till after hell

I hold my honey and I store my bread
In little jars and cabinets of my will.
I label clearly, and each latch and lid
I bid, Be firm till I return from hell.
I am very hungry. I am incomplete.
And none can tell when I may dine again.
No man can give me any word but Wait,
The puny light. I keep eyes pointed in;
Hoping that, when the devil days of my hurt
Drag out to their last dregs and I resume
On such legs as are left me, in such heart
As I can manage, remember to go home,
My taste will not have turned insensitive
To honey and bread old purity could love.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“We are things of dry hours and the involuntary plan,
Grayed in, and gray.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“To say yes is to die
A lot or a little.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“It was Mabbie without the grammar school gates.
And Mabbie was all of seven.
And Mabbie was cut from a chocolate bar.
And Mabbie thought life was heaven.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“I hold my honey and I store my bread
In little jars and cabinets of my will.
I label clearly, and each latch and lid
I bid, Be firm till I return from hell.
I am very hungry. I am incomplete.
And none can tell when I may dine again.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“People who have no children can be hard:
Attain a mail of ice and insolence:”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“What mannerisms I present, employ,
Are camouflage, and what my mouths remark
To word-wall off that broadness of the dark
Is pitiful,
I am not brave at all.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“Her creamy child kissed by the black maid! square on the mouth!
World yelled, world writhed, world turned to light and rolled
Into her kitchen, nearly knocked her down.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“Well, life has been a baffled vehicle
And baffling. But she fights, and
Has fought, according to her lights and
The lenience of her whirling-place.

She fights with semi-folded arms,
Her strong bag, and the stiff
Frost of her face (that challenges "When" and "If.")
And altogether she does Rather Well.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems

“Time upholds or overturns
The many, tight, and small concerns.”
― Gwendolyn Brooks, Selected Poems