Gloria House

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Born in Tampa, Florida, House (aka Aneb Kgositsile) began expressing herself through poetry before her age reached double digits. She published her first books of poetry in the 1980s, including Blood River (1983) and Rainrituals (1989), both published by Broadside Press. In 2003, her third collection, Shrines, was published by Third World Press. Medicine, her most recent book, was published in 2017 as a joint endeavor of Broadside Lotus and University of Detroit Mercy Press.  All of House’s poetry collections have been published under her chosen name, Aneb Kgositsile. During the Black Arts/Black Consciousness movement, House was among a community of artists that included poet Sonia Sanchez; poet and founder of Third World Press Haki Madhubuti; South African Poet Laureate Keorapetse Kgositsile; playwright Ron Milner; dancer-choreographer Jackie Hillsman; and poet and founder of Broadside Press Dudley Randall. House was also active in the free speech movement while attending UC Berkeley. After leaving university to teach in a freedom school in Selma, Alabama, she worked as a field secretary in the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). She drafted SNCC’s statement against the Vietnam War, the first public opposition to the war to be issued by a civil rights organization. Source 

SELMA, 1965

Amid the ghosts of civil rights marchers

in Selma

in the summer so hot,

the children sang in the paths

of the afternoon showers,

"Before I'd be a slave,

I'd be buried in my grave. ..."

From the freedom school window

We watched them come

across the lawns of the housing projects

down the rain-rutted dirt roads,

through the puddles waiting cool for bare feet.

(Touch the dripping bush, break a leaf and smell

the pungency of green.)

They were tattered angels of hope,

plaits caught at odd angles

and standing indignantly,

a ripped hem hanging like a train,

grey knees poking through denim frames.

Dancing the whole trip,

they performed their historic drama

against the set of their

wet brick project homes.

Published:

1983

Length:

Regular

Literary Movements:

Civil Rights Movement

Anthology Years:

2023

Themes:

Memory & The Past

Racial Injustice

Literary Devices:

Dialogue

conversation between two or more people as a feature of a book, play, or movie

Imagery

visually descriptive or figurative language, especially in a literary work

Metaphor

a comparison between two unrelated things through a shared characteristic