Item Information
Title
The Carolina Magazine. Volume 68, number 5.
Date
February 1939
Type
Text
Text
The Carolina Magazine
The Song of the Highway
I am the Highway,
Long, white, winding Highway,
Binding coast to coast
And people to people;
I am the spine of the earth.
Over the hills I glide
And then, come swooping down
To some deserted spot.
Over river and lake I stride—
Through farm and field, and town,
Through desert sands, white-hot.
I laugh when the brooklets laugh,
And weep with wayside trees
So bent—so broken by the wind.
Sometimes the birds and flowers
Fill my path with song and bloom;
Sometimes a fragrant breeze
Leaves me drenched with faint perfume.
I hear the sounds of earth—
The low of cattle on the plains,
Clatter of hoof, sound of horn,
Rustling fields of rye,
Of wheat, of tassled corn;
Sweet sounds, so dear—
As through the year
Life marches on.
I am old—sad things I know,
Ache of road-worn travelers,
Lonely hours; the tragedy of pioneers
Who trudged through scorching lands,
Through rain—and snow,
Who bartered with famine—thirst—
And death—to give me birth.
But I go on in silence,
For those who know my life
Will sing my song,
Song of the Highway,
Long, white, winding Highway.
—Pauli Murray.
(A native of Durham, North Carolina, Miss Murray was the recent applicant for entrance to the graduate school of the University. The above poem is reprinted from the anthology Negro collected by Nancy Cunard and published by Wishart and Co., London, 1934. The poem is reprinted with the permission of Miss Murray.)
The Song of the Highway
I am the Highway,
Long, white, winding Highway,
Binding coast to coast
And people to people;
I am the spine of the earth.
Over the hills I glide
And then, come swooping down
To some deserted spot.
Over river and lake I stride—
Through farm and field, and town,
Through desert sands, white-hot.
I laugh when the brooklets laugh,
And weep with wayside trees
So bent—so broken by the wind.
Sometimes the birds and flowers
Fill my path with song and bloom;
Sometimes a fragrant breeze
Leaves me drenched with faint perfume.
I hear the sounds of earth—
The low of cattle on the plains,
Clatter of hoof, sound of horn,
Rustling fields of rye,
Of wheat, of tassled corn;
Sweet sounds, so dear—
As through the year
Life marches on.
I am old—sad things I know,
Ache of road-worn travelers,
Lonely hours; the tragedy of pioneers
Who trudged through scorching lands,
Through rain—and snow,
Who bartered with famine—thirst—
And death—to give me birth.
But I go on in silence,
For those who know my life
Will sing my song,
Song of the Highway,
Long, white, winding Highway.
—Pauli Murray.
(A native of Durham, North Carolina, Miss Murray was the recent applicant for entrance to the graduate school of the University. The above poem is reprinted from the anthology Negro collected by Nancy Cunard and published by Wishart and Co., London, 1934. The poem is reprinted with the permission of Miss Murray.)