Poems by Claude McKay

The perfume of your body dulls my sense.
I want nor wine nor weed; your breath alone
Suffices. ...

Applauding youths laughed with young prostitutes
And watched her perfect, half-clothed body swa...

I hear the halting footsteps of a lass
In Negro Harlem when the night lets fall
Its veil. I see...

If we must die, let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round ...

I plucked my soul out of its secret place,
And held it to the mirror of my eye,
To see it lik...