EARLY SPRING
EARLY SPRING IN WEST QUEEN WEST
I saw strange fruit on a tree in my
neighborhood today Exotic tiny
bananas? I live in Canada up north
so no we have no bananas
But we had some lynchings more
than a century ago in the East
When the slaves thought they’d escaped
only to find that they had not And the blues
they still reverberate through Africville
Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
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Spring 2010 Songanddancegirl Abel Meeropol Billie Holiday
