The Song, Part I

The voice, the mill, the sword, the song,

a voice of clay and one of gold,

I know he spoke in high-pitched tones,

Just like the country boy he was,

It was the twang that Lincoln spoke,

In his own time the less refined

Out of only crude vessels made,

A runaway slave in waist-coat reserve,

Spake capitals and newest worlds,

a voice of clay and one of gold.

But still the whole wide country heard,

One Illinois freeborn and one ex-slave,

a voice of clay and one of gold,

Beat down alike by feet of greed,

‘Gainst pioneers and slavers’ lies,

a voice of clay and one of gold,

Until the urns and gins they built,

Turned cotton fields to ash,

And planters under the smokehouse burned,

And those marauders stood astride,

their ridden doom of horses’ hooves,

The voice, the mill, the sword, the song,

a voice of clay and one of gold,

But still the dead all died alone.

-Albert Turner Goins