Knoxville, Tennessee
I always like summer
best
you can eat fresh corn
from daddy's garden
and okra
and greens
and cabbage
and lots of
barbecue
and buttermilk
and homemade ice-cream
at the church picnic
and listen to
gospel music
outside
at the church
homecoming
and you go to the mountains with
your grandmother
and go barefooted
and be warm
all the time
not only when you go to bed
and sleep
Nikki Giovanni, "Knoxville, Tennessee" from Black Feeling, Black Talk/Black Judgement. Copyright © 1970 by Nikki Giovanni. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers Inc..
Source:
Black Feeling, Black Talk/Black Judgement
(Black Feeling, Black Talk/Black Judgement, 1970)
