Poem by Claude McKay

Outcast

For the dim regions whence my fathers came 
My spirit, bondaged by the body, longs. 
Words felt, but never heard, my lips would frame; 
My soul would sing forgotten jungle songs. 
I would go back to darkness and to peace, 
But the great western world holds me in fee, 
And I may never hope for full release 
While to its alien gods I bend my knee. 
Something in me is lost, forever lost, 
Some vital thing has gone out of my heart, 
And I must walk the way of life a ghost 
Among the sons of earth, a thing apart; 
For I was born, far from my native clime, 
Under the white man’s menace, out of time.

1. North and South
2. Wild May
3. Birds of Prey
4. Home Thoughts
5. The Castaways

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