Question

by Georgia Douglas Johnson

Where are the brave men, where are the strong men?
Pygmies rise
And spawn the earth.
Weak-kneed, weak-hearted, and afraid,
Afraid to face the counsel of their timid hearts,
Afraid to look men squarely,
Down they gaze–
With fatal fascination
Down, down–
Into the whirling maggot sands
Of prejudice.

_{From Bronze (1922), by Georgia Douglas Johnson.}