The Little Black Boy Poem by William Blake

The Little Black Boy

Rating: 3.0


My mother bore me in the southern wild,
And I am black, but oh my soul is white!
White as an angel is the English child,
But I am black, as if bereaved of light.

My mother taught me underneath a tree,
And, sitting down before the heat of day,
She took me on her lap and kissed me,
And, pointed to the east, began to say:

'Look on the rising sun: there God does live,
And gives His light, and gives His heat away,
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning, joy in the noonday.

'And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love
And these black bodies and this sunburnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.

'For when our souls have learn'd the heat to bear,
The cloud will vanish, we shall hear His voice,
Saying, 'Come out from the grove, my love and care
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice','

Thus did my mother say, and kissed me;
And thus I say to little English boy.
When I from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy

I'll shade him from the heat till he can bear
To lean in joy upon our Father's knee;
And then I'll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like him, and he will then love me.

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Colleen Watt 08 April 2006

These old poems are so glorious, do our members only comment on modernstuff often very hard to understand

10 7 Reply
Edgar Stevens 11 June 2015

love conquers loneliness

3 5 Reply
Duncan Stephen 21 November 2015

William Blake is a very powerful poet as is seen in this poem.

3 3 Reply
Konab Ghumman 07 May 2019

Blake is a very powerful poet as is seen in this poem.

0 0 Reply
Mobein 21 January 2018

This is better than many verses of Bible and Quraan...

0 0 Reply
Solomon Senxer 13 September 2019

Huh! ! But, yeah! The poem is great!

0 0
Sassgtrsbergb 05 December 2017

Sdfsdtgdsfgdtgrdgrdtgetr

0 0 Reply
Pradnya kasbe 10 November 2017

Its a very intresting. In stanza 1 when boy describes him self it is wonderful. And inspiring

0 1 Reply
Vevonulu Cho-o 25 September 2016

I really like this poem. Its really comforting.

0 1 Reply
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