Gwendolyn Brooks

Gwendolyn Brooks

Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks (June 7, 1917 – December 3, 2000) was an African-American poet. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1950 and was appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968 and Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1985.

Read more about Gwendolyn Brooks:  Biography, Career, Excerpt, Honors and Legacy, Bibliography

Famous quotes by gwendolyn brooks:

    Mrs. Small went to the kitchen for her pocketbook
    And came back to the living room with a peculiar look
    And the coffee pot.
    Pocketbook. Pot.
    Pot. Pocketbook.
    Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)

    Swing low swing low sweet sweet chariot.
    Nothing but a plain black boy.
    Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)

    He zigzagged.
    He was a knotted hiss.
    He was an insane hash
    Of rebellious small strengths
    Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)

    Forgotten and stinking they stick in the can.
    And the vase breath’s better and all, and all.
    And so for the end of our life to a man,
    Just over, just over and all.
    Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)

    Even now she does the snake-hips with a hiss,
    Slops the bad wine across her shantung, talks
    Of pregnancy, guitars and bridgework, walks
    In parks or alleys, comes haply on the verge
    Of happiness, haply hysterics. Is.
    Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)