I know why the caged bird sings….I first “heard” these words in a piece of music – Buckshot Lefonque’s version to be precise.

Only later did I realize it was an actual poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar, published in 1899; the phrase I cited above might be familiar to some as the title of Maya Angelou’s autobiography.

Here is the whole poem:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46459/sympathy-56d22658afbc0

And here is an excerpt:

Dunbar died at age 33 in 1906. He was gifted, achieved recognition during his life time, but also troubled, in ill health and caught in a political trap. The public wanted his humorous, sometimes sentimental accounts of Black life during and after slavery written in dialect, and showed disdain for his descriptions of violence and injustice. To sell his works and make it as a writer, critics claim he resorted to caricaturing his own race, portraying black slaves as faithful and obedient, slow-witted but good-natured workers appreciative of their benevolent white owners. Dunbar drew the ire of many critics for his stereotyped characters, and some of his detractors even alleged that he contributed to racist concepts while simultaneously disdaining such thinking. (See link below)

Many current scholars draw a more complex picture, pointing to his many ways of describing and attacking racism, more so in his poetry than his novels and story collections.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/paul-laurence-dunbar

The poem I chose is a lament, a painfully sad expression of all that is denied to the being deprived of its freedom.

Dunbar’s parents were slaves. The majority of their descendants live in different kinds of cages – being deprived of the rights to walk without fear, to chose where to live and be treated as equals. On the 50th anniversary of MLK’s assassination today I fear he is rolling in his grave.