Black History Month

A Street in Bronzeville

Gwendolyn Brooks

Poetry, 1945

Gwendolyn Brooks's A Street in Bronzeville is organized in two parts, the first containing mostly short poems and a few longer ones describing the hopes and disappointments of residents of Bronzeville (a Chicago neighborhood). Love between black men and women is deromanticized in "The Old-Marrieds," for instance. In the poem, an old couple has grown so familiar with the routine of their lives that their environment has become stifling. Brooks also focuses on discrimination among blacks in such poems as "The Ballad of Chocolate Mabbie" and "The Ballad of Pearl May Lee." In the former title, Willie Boone chooses a lighter-skinned girl than Mabbie; in the latter title, Pearl May Lee exacts revenge when a similar situation threatens her. The black women in these poems suffer from poverty and discrimination as the dominant condition of their lives, seen vividly in "Obituary for a Living Lady" and "Sadie and Maude."

Two of the longer narrative poems tell the stories of black men. In "Negro Hero," for example, a black soldier risks his life for white soldiers while making them more aware of their own values. "The Sundays of Satin-Legs Smith" portrays a man who attempts to control a threatening environment with sharp clothes, a hip demeanor, and sexual prowess. In this collection of poems, optimism and pride are tempered by Brooks's realistic portrayal of the squandering of human potential.

The second part, "Gay Chaps at the Bar," contains twelve sonnets that reflect the experiences of black soldiers in World War II in the natural rhythms of everyday speech. The poems reveal the soldiers' thoughts about their lives and relationships as well as the events of the war. In spite of the widespread racism portrayed, the reader sees the black men achieve dignity and equality in the heat of battle and in death.