Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

INVOCATION by HELENE JOHNSON

First Line: LET ME BE BURIED IN THE RAIN
Last Line: GROW HIGH ABOVE MY HEAD.
Subject(s): AFRICAN AMERICANS; AFRICAN AMERICANS - WOMEN; NEGROES; AMERICAN BLACKS;
Let me be buried in the rain
In a deep, dripping wood,
Under the warm wet breast of Earth
Where once a gnarled tree stood.
And paint a picture on my tomb
With dirt and a piece of bough
Of a girl and a boy beneath a round, ripe moon
Eating of love with an eager spoon
And vowing an eager vow.
And do not keep my plot mowed smooth
And clean as a spinster's bed,
But let the weed, the flower, the tree,
Riotous, rampant, wild and free,
Grow high above my head.



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