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dorothy rudd moore - o black and unknown bards lyrics

o black and unknown bards of long ago
how came your lips to touch the sacred fire?
how, in your darkness, did you come to know
the power and beauty of the minstrel’s lyre?
who first from midst his bonds lifted his eyes?
who first from out the still watch, lone and long
feeling the ancient faith of prophets rise
within his dark+kept soul, burst into song?

heart of what slave poured out such melody
as “steal away to jesus”? on its strains
his spirit must have nightly floated free
though still about his hands he felt his chains
who heard great “jordan roll”? whose starward eye
saw chariot “swing low”? and who was he
that breathed that comforting, melodic sigh
“n0body knows de trouble i see”?

what merely living clod, what captive thing
could up toward god through all its darkness grope
and find within its deadened heart to sing
these songs of sorrow, love and faith, and hope?
how did it catch that subtle undertone
that note in music heard not with the ears?
how sound the elusive reed so seldom blown
which stirs the soul or melts the heart to tears
not that great german master in his dream
of harmonies that thundered amongst the stars
at the creation, ever heard a theme
n0bler than “go down, moses.” mark its bars
how like a mighty trumpet+call they stir
the blood. such are the notes that men have sung
going to valorous deeds; such tones there were
that helped make history when time was young

there is a wide, wide wonder in it all
that from degraded rest and servile toil
the fiery spirit of the seer should call
these simple children of the sun and soil
o black slave singers, gone, forgot, unfamed
you — you alone, of all the long, long line
of those who’ve sung untaught, unknown, unnamed
have stretched out upward, seeking the divine

you sang not deeds of heroes or of kings;
no chant of bl++dy war, no exulting pean
of arms+won triumphs; but your humble strings
you touched in chord with music empyrean
you sang far better than you knew; the songs
that for your listeners’ hungry hearts sufficed
still live, — but more than this to you belongs:
you sang a race from wood and stone to christ

- dorothy rudd moore lyrics

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