Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SEVENTH STREET, by JEAN TOOMER


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

SEVENTH STREET, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Money burns the pocket, pocket hurts
Subject(s): African Americans; City & Town Life; Social Commentaries; United States - Prohibition (1919-1933); Negroes; American Blacks


Money burns the pocket, pocket hurts,
Bootleggers in silken shirts,
Ballooned, zooming Cadillacs,
Whizzing, whizzing down the street-car tracks.
Seventh Street is a bastard of Prohibition and the War. A crude-boned, soft-skinned wedge of nigger
life breathing its loafer air, jazz songs and love, thrusting unconscious rhythms, black reddish
blood into the white and whitewashed wood of Washington. Stale soggy wood of Washington. Wedges
rust in soggy wood. . . Split it! In two! Again! Shred it! . . the sun. Wedges are brilliant in the
sun; ribbons of wet wood dry and blow away. Black reddish blood. Pouring for crude-boned
soft-skinned life, who set you flowing? Blood suckers of the War would spin in a frenzy of
dizziness if they drank your blood. Prohibition would put a stop to it. Who set you flowing? White
and whitewash disappear in blood. Who set you flowing? Flowing down the smooth asphalt of Seventh
Street, in shanties, brick office buildings, theaters, drug stores, restaurants, and cabarets?
Eddying on the corners? Swirling like a blood-red smoke up where the buzzards fly in heaven?
God would not dare to suck black red blood. A Nigger God! He would duck his head in shame and call
for the Judgement Day. Who set you flowing?

Money burns the pocket, pocket hurts,
Bootleggers in silken shirts,
Ballooned, zooming Cadillacs,
Whizzing, whizzing down the street-car tracks.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net