........Caged Bird Sings

"Sympathy" a poem, written by Paul Laurence Dunbar, an African-American poet.


I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,

When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,

When he beats his bars and would be free;

It is not a carol of joy or glee,

But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core,

But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings -

I know why the caged bird sings.


Dunbar, Paul Laurence (1993). Joanne M. Braxton. ed. The Collected Poetry of Paul Laurence Dunbar. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press. p. 102. ISBN 0-8139-1438-8.