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Behold her, single in the field, Yon solitary Highland Lass! Reaping and singing by herself; Stop here, or gently pass! Alone she cuts and binds the grain, And sings a melancholy strain; O listen! for the Vale profound Is overflowing with the sound.
No Nightingale did ever chaunt More welcome notes to weary bands Of travellers in some shady haunt, Among Arabian sands: A voice so thrilling ne'er was heard In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird, Breaking the silence of the seas Among the farthest Hebrides.
Will no one tell me what she sings?-- Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow For old, unhappy, far-off things, And battles long ago: Or is it some more humble lay, Familiar matter of today? Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain, That has been, and may be again?
Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sang As if her song could have no ending; I saw her singing at her work, And o'er the sickle bending;-- I listen'd, motionless and still; And, as I mounted up the hill, The music in my heart I bore, Long after it was heard no more.
'"The Solitary Reaper" is one of Wordsworth's most famous post-Lyrical Ballads lyrics.[1] The words of the reaper's song are incomprehensible to the speaker, so his attention is free to focus on the tone, expressive beauty, and the blissful mood it creates in him. The poem functions to 'praise the beauty of music and its fluid expressive beauty, the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" that Wordsworth identified at the heart of poetry.'
The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost (1874-1963) during his "Mountain Interval," 1920
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.
Teacher: Why are you late, Joseph? Joseph: Because of a sign down the road. Teacher: What does a sign have to do with your being late? Joseph: The sign said, "School Ahead, Go Slow!"
Martin Luther King's I have a dream speech on 28 August
1963
I
am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest
demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five
score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today,
signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great
beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the
flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long
night of captivity.
But
one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later,
the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation
and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a
lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity.
One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of
American society and finds himself in exile in his own land. So we have come here
today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In
a sense we've come to our nation's Capital to cash a check. When the architects
of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the
Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every
American was to fall heir.
This
note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be
guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness.
It
is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as
her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred
obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check; a check which has
come back marked "insufficient funds."
But
we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe
that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this
nation. So we have come to cash this check- a check that will give us upon
demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
We
have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of
now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the
tranquilizing drug of gradualism.
Now
is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise
from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial
justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial
injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a
reality for all of God's children.
It
would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This
sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until
there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three
is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow
off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation
returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in
America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of
revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright
day of justice emerges.
But
there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold
which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful
place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our
thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must
forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We
must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again
and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with
soul force.
The
marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us
to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced
by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied
up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is
inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And
as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn
back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will
you be satisfied?”
We
can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable
horrors of police brutality.
We
can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel,
cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the
cities.
We
cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller
ghetto to a larger one.
We
can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood
and robbed of their dignity by signs stating "for whites only."
We
cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro
in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote.
No,
no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down
like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I
am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and
tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you
have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the
storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have
been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that
unearned suffering is redemptive.
Go
back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to
Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern
cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not
wallow in the valley of despair.
I
say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today
and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American
dream.
I
have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true
meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all
men are created equal."
I
have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves
and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the
table of brotherhood.
I
have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering
with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be
transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I
have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where
they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their
character.
I
have a dream today.
I
have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its
governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and
nullification, that one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black
girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as
sisters and brothers.
I
have a dream today.
I
have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and
mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the
crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be
revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This
is our hope. This is the faith that I will go back to the South with. With this
faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.
With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our
nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.
With
this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle
together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing
that we will be free one day.
This
will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new
meaning, "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrims' pride, from every
mountainside, let freedom ring."
And
if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring
from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty
mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of
Pennsylvania.
Let
freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from
the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that; let freedom ring from
the Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of
Tennessee.
Let
freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside,
let freedom ring.
And
when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from
every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be
able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men,
Jews and gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and
sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! Free at last!
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"
In
a little district west of Washington Square the streets have run crazy and
broken themselves into small strips called "places." These
"places" make strange angles and curves. One Street crosses itself a
time or two. An artist once discovered a valuable possibility in this street.
Suppose a collector with a bill for paints, paper and canvas should, in
traversing this route, suddenly meet himself coming back, without a cent having
been paid on account!
So, to quaint old Greenwich Village the art people soon came prowling, hunting for north windows and eighteenth-century gables and Dutch attics and low rents. Then they imported some pewter mugs and a chafing dish or two from Sixth Avenue, and became a "colony."
At
the top of a squatty, three-story brick Sue and Johnsy had their studio.
"Johnsy" was familiar for Joanna. One was from Maine; the other from
California. They had met at the table d'hôte of an Eighth Street
"Delmonico's," and found their tastes in art, chicory salad and bishop
sleeves so congenial that the joint studio resulted.
That
was in May. In November a cold, unseen stranger, whom the doctors called
Pneumonia, stalked about the colony, touching one here and there with his icy
fingers. Over on the east side this ravager strode boldly, smiting his victims
by scores, but his feet trod slowly through the maze of the narrow and
moss-grown "places."
Mr.
Pneumonia was not what you would call a chivalric old gentleman. A mite of a
little woman with blood thinned by California zephyrs was hardly fair game for
the red-fisted, short-breathed old duffer. But Johnsy he smote; and she lay,
scarcely moving, on her painted iron bedstead, looking through the small Dutch
window-panes at the blank side of the next brick house.
One
morning the busy doctor invited Sue into the hallway with a shaggy, gray
eyebrow.
"She
has one chance in - let us say, ten," he said, as he shook down the
mercury in his clinical thermometer. " And that chance is for her to want
to live. This way people have of lining-u on the side of the undertaker makes
the entire pharmacopoeia look silly. Your little lady has made up her mind that
she's not going to get well. Has she anything on her mind?"
"She
- she wanted to paint the Bay of Naples some day." said Sue.
"Paint?
- bosh! Has she anything on her mind worth thinking twice - a man for instance?"
"A
man?" said Sue, with a jew's-harp twang in her voice. "Is a man worth
- but, no, doctor; there is nothing of the kind."
"Well,
it is the weakness, then," said the doctor. "I will do all that
science, so far as it may filter through my efforts, can accomplish. But
whenever my patient begins to count the carriages in her funeral procession I
subtract 50 per cent from the curative power of medicines. If you will get her
to ask one question about the new winter styles in cloak sleeves I will promise
you a one-in-five chance for her, instead of one in ten."
After
the doctor had gone Sue went into the workroom and cried a Japanese napkin to a
pulp. Then she swaggered into Johnsy's room with her drawing board, whistling
ragtime.
Johnsy lay, scarcely making a ripple under the bedclothes, with her face toward the window. Sue stopped whistling, thinking she was asleep.
She
arranged her board and began a pen-and-ink drawing to illustrate a magazine
story. Young artists must pave their way to Art by drawing pictures for
magazine stories that young authors write to pave their way to Literature.
As
Sue was sketching a pair of elegant horseshow riding trousers and a monocle of
the figure of the hero, an Idaho cowboy, she heard a low sound, several times
repeated. She went quickly to the bedside.
Johnsy's
eyes were open wide. She was looking out the window and counting - counting
backward.
"Twelve,"
she said, and little later "eleven"; and then "ten," and
"nine"; and then "eight" and "seven", almost
together.
Sue look solicitously out of the WINDOW. What was there to count? There was only a
bare, dreary yard to be seen, and the blank side of the brick house twenty feet
away. An old, old ivy vine, gnarled and decayed at the roots, climbed half way
up the brick wall. The cold breath of autumn had stricken its leaves from the
vine until its skeleton branches clung, almost bare, to the crumbling bricks.
"What
is it, dear?" asked Sue.
"Six,"
said Johnsy, in almost a whisper. "They're falling faster now. Three days
ago there were almost a hundred. It made my head ache to count them. But now
it's easy. There goes another one. There are only five left now."
"Five
what, dear? Tell your Sudie."
"Leaves.
On the ivy vine. When the last one falls I must go, too. I've known that for
three days. Didn't the doctor tell you?"
"Oh,
I never heard of such nonsense," complained Sue, with magnificent scorn.
"What have old ivy leaves to do with your getting well? And you used to
love that vine so, you naughty girl. Don't be a goosey. Why, the doctor told me
this morning that your chances for getting well real soon were - let's see
exactly what he said - he said the chances were ten to one! Why, that's almost as
good a chance as we have in New York when we ride on the street cars or walk
past a new building. Try to take some broth now, and let Sudie go back to her
drawing, so she can sell the editor man with it, and buy port wine for her sick
child, and pork chops for her greedy self."
"You needn't get any more wine," said Johnsy, keeping her eyes fixed out the WINDOW. "There goes another. No, I don't want any broth. That leaves just
four. I want to see the last one fall before it gets dark. Then I'll go,
too."
"Johnsy, dear," said Sue, bending over her, "will you promise me to keep your eyes closed, and not look out the WINDOW until I am done working? I must hand those drawings in by to-morrow. I need the light, or I would draw the shade down."
"Couldn't
you draw in the other room?" asked Johnsy, coldly.
"I'd
rather be here by you," said Sue. "Beside, I don't want you to keep
looking at those silly ivy leaves."
"Tell me as soon as you have finished," said Johnsy, closing her eyes, and lying white and still as fallen statue, "because I want to see the last one fall. I'm TIRED of waiting. I'm tired of thinking. I want to turn loose my hold on everything, and go sailing down, down, just like one of those poor, tired leaves."
"Try
to sleep," said Sue. "I must call Behrman up to be my model for the
old hermit miner. I'll not be gone a minute. Don't try to move 'til I come
back."
Old Behrman was a painter who lived on the ground floor beneath them. He was past sixty and had a Michael Angelo's Moses beard curling down from the head of a satyr along with the body of an imp. Behrman was a failure in art. Forty years he had wielded the brush without getting near enough to touch the hem of his Mistress's robe. He had been always about to paint a masterpiece, but had never yet begun it. For several years he had painted nothing except now and then a daub in the line of commerce or advertising. He earned a little by serving as a model to those young artists in the colony who could not PAY THE price of a professional. He drank gin to excess, and still talked of his coming masterpiece. For the rest he was a fierce little old man, who scoffed terribly at softness in any one, and who regarded himself as especial mastiff-in-waiting to protect the two young artists in the studio above.
Sue
found Behrman smelling strongly of juniper berries in his dimly lighted den
below. In one corner was a blank canvas on an easel that had been waiting there
for twenty-five years to receive the first line of the masterpiece. She told
him of Johnsy's fancy, and how she feared she would, indeed, light and fragile
as a leaf herself, float away, when her slight hold upon the world grew weaker.
Old
Behrman, with his red eyes plainly streaming, shouted his contempt and derision
for such idiotic imaginings.
"Vass!"
he cried. "Is dere people in de world mit der foolishness to die because
leafs dey drop off from a confounded vine? I haf not heard of such a thing. No,
I will not bose as a model for your fool hermit-dunderhead. Vy do you allow dot
silly pusiness to come in der brain of her? Ach, dot poor leetle Miss
Yohnsy."
"She
is very ill and weak," said Sue, "and the fever has left her mind
morbid and full of strange fancies. Very well, Mr. Behrman, if you do not care
to pose for me, you needn't. But I think you are a horrid old - old
flibbertigibbet."
"You
are just like a woman!" yelled Behrman. "Who said I will not bose? Go
on. I come mit you. For half an hour I haf peen trying to say dot I am ready to
bose. Gott! dis is not any blace in which one so goot as Miss Yohnsy shall lie
sick. Some day I vill baint a masterpiece, and ve shall all go away. Gott!
yes."
Johnsy
was sleeping when they went upstairs. Sue pulled the shade down to the
window-sill, and motioned Behrman into the other room. In there they peered out
the window fearfully at the ivy vine. Then they looked at each other for a
moment without speaking. A persistent, cold rain was falling, mingled with
snow. Behrman, in his old blue shirt, took his seat as the hermit miner on an
upturned kettle for a rock.
When
Sue awoke from an hour's sleep the next morning she found Johnsy with dull,
wide-open eyes staring at the drawn green shade.
"Pull
it up; I want to see," she ordered, in a whisper.
Wearily
Sue obeyed.
But,
lo! after the beating rain and fierce gusts of wind that had endured through
the livelong night, there yet stood out against the brick wall one ivy leaf. It
was the last one on the vine. Still dark green near its stem, with its serrated
edges tinted with the yellow of dissolution and decay, it hung bravely from the
branch some twenty feet above the ground.
"It
is the last one," said Johnsy. "I thought it would surely fall during
the night. I heard the wind. It will fall to-day, and I shall die at the same
time."
"Dear,
dear!" said Sue, leaning her worn face down to the pillow, "think of
me, if you won't think of yourself. What would I do?"
But
Johnsy did not answer. The lonesomest thing in all the world is a soul when it
is making ready to go on its mysterious, far journey. The fancy seemed to
possess her more strongly as one by one the ties that bound her to friendship
and to earth were loosed.
The
day wore away, and even through the twilight they could see the lone ivy leaf
clinging to its stem against the wall. And then, with the coming of the night
the north wind was again loosed, while the rain still beat against the windows
and pattered down from the low Dutch eaves.
When
it was light enough Johnsy, the merciless, commanded that the shade be raised.
The
ivy leaf was still there.
Johnsy
lay for a long time looking at it. And then she called to Sue, who was stirring
her chicken broth over the gas stove.
"I've
been a bad girl, Sudie," said Johnsy. "Something has made that last
leaf stay there to show me how wicked I was. It is a sin to want to die. You
may bring a me a little broth now, and some milk with a little port in it, and
- no; bring me a hand-mirror first, and then pack some pillows about me, and I
will sit up and watch you cook."
And
hour later she said:
"Sudie,
some day I hope to paint the Bay of Naples."
The
doctor came in the afternoon, and Sue had an excuse to go into the hallway as
he left.
"Even
chances," said the doctor, taking Sue's thin, shaking hand in his.
"With good nursing you'll win." And now I must see another case I
have downstairs. Behrman, his name is - some kind of an artist, I believe.
Pneumonia, too. He is an old, weak man, and the attack is acute. There is no
hope for him; but he goes to the hospital to-day to be made more
comfortable."
The
next day the doctor said to Sue: "She's out of danger. You won. Nutrition
and care now - that's all."
And
that afternoon Sue came to the bed where Johnsy lay, contentedly knitting a
very blue and very useless woollen shoulder scarf, and put one arm around her,
pillows and all.
"I
have something to tell you, white mouse," she said. "Mr. Behrman died
of pneumonia to-day in the hospital. He was ill only two days. The janitor
found him the morning of the first day in his room downstairs helpless with
pain. His shoes and clothing were wet through and icy cold. They couldn't
imagine where he had been on such a dreadful night. And then they found a
lantern, still lighted, and a ladder that had been dragged from its place, and
some scattered brushes, and a palette with green and yellow colors mixed on it,
and - look out the window, dear, at the last ivy leaf on the wall. Didn't you
wonder why it never fluttered or moved when the wind blew? Ah, darling, it's
Behrman's masterpiece - he painted it there the night that the last leaf
fell."
Thank you very kindly, my friends.
As I listened to Ralph Abernathy and his eloquent and generous introduction and
then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It's always
good to have your closest friend and associate to say something good about you.
And Ralph Abernathy is the best friend that I have in the world. I'm delighted
to see each of you here tonight in spite of a storm warning. You reveal that
you are determined to go on anyhow.
Something is happening in Memphis; something is happening in our world. And you
know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with the possibility of
taking a kind of general and panoramic view of the whole of human history up to
now, and the Almighty said to me, "Martin Luther King, which age would you
like to live in?" I would take my mental flight by Egypt and I would watch
God's children in their magnificent trek from the dark dungeons of Egypt
through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the
promised land. And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there.
I would move on by Greece and take
my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides
and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon. And I would watch them around
the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality. But I
wouldn't stop there.
I would go on, even to the great heyday of the Roman Empire. And I would see
developments around there, through various emperors and leaders. But I wouldn't
stop there.
I would even come up to the day of
the Renaissance, and get a quick picture of all that the Renaissance did for
the cultural and aesthetic life of man. But I wouldn't stop there.
I would even go by the way that the
man for whom I am named had his habitat. And I would watch Martin Luther as he
tacked his ninety-five theses on the door at the church of Wittenberg. But I
wouldn't stop there.
I would come on up even to 1863, and
watch a vacillating President by the name of Abraham Lincoln finally come to
the conclusion that he had to sign the Emancipation Proclamation. But I
wouldn't stop there.
I would even come up to the early thirties, and see a man grappling with the
problems of the bankruptcy of his nation. And come with an eloquent cry that we have nothing to fear but "fear itself." But
I wouldn't stop there.
Strangely enough, I would turn to
the Almighty, and say, "If you allow me to live just a few years in the
second half of the 20th century, I will be happy."
Now that's a strange statement to
make, because the world is all messed up. The nation is sick. Trouble is in the
land; confusion all around. That's a strange statement. But I know, somehow,
that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars. And I see God working
in this period of the twentieth century in a way that men, in some strange way,
are responding.
Something is happening in our world.
The masses of people are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today, whether
they are in Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra, Ghana; New York
City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi; or Memphis, Tennessee -- the cry
is always the same: "We want to be free."
And another reason that I'm happy to
live in this period is that we have been forced to a point where we are going
to have to grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple with
through history, but the demands didn't force them to do it. Survival demands
that we grapple with them. Men, for years now, have been talking about war and
peace. But now, no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice
between violence and nonviolence in this world; it's nonviolence or
nonexistence. That is where we are today.
And also in the human rights revolution, if something isn't done, and done in a
hurry, to bring the colored peoples of the world out of their long years of
poverty, their long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed. Now,
I'm just happy that God has allowed me to live in this period to see what is
unfolding. And I'm happy that He's allowed me to be in Memphis.
I can remember -- I can remember
when Negroes were just going around as Ralph has said, so often, scratching
where they didn't itch, and laughing when they were not tickled. But that day
is all over. We mean business now, and we are determined to gain our rightful
place in God's world.
And that's all this whole thing is about. We aren't engaged in any negative
protest and in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are
determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying -- We are
saying that we are God's children. And that we are God's children, we don't
have to live like we are forced to live.
Now, what does all of this mean in this great period of history? It means that
we've got to stay together. We've got to stay together and maintain unity. You
know, whenever Pharaoh wanted to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had
a favorite, favorite formula for doing it. What was that? He kept the slaves
fighting among themselves. But whenever the slaves get together, something
happens in Pharaoh's court, and he cannot hold the slaves in slavery. When the
slaves get together, that's the beginning of getting out of slavery. Now let us
maintain unity.
Secondly, let us keep the issues where they are. The issue is injustice. The
issue is the refusal of Memphis to be fair and honest in its dealings with its
public servants, who happen to be sanitation workers. Now, we've got to keep
attention on that. That's always the problem with a little violence. You know
what happened the other day, and the press dealt only with the window-breaking.
I read the articles. They very seldom got around to mentioning the fact that
one thousand, three hundred sanitation workers are on strike, and that Memphis
is not being fair to them, and that Mayor Loeb is in dire need of a doctor.
They didn't get around to that.
Now we're going to march again, and we've got to march again, in order to put
the issue where it is supposed to be -- and force everybody to see that there
are thirteen hundred of God's children here suffering, sometimes going hungry,
going through dark and dreary nights wondering how this thing is going to come
out. That's the issue. And we've got to say to the nation: We know how it's
coming out. For when people get caught up with that which is right and they are
willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.
We aren't going to let any mace stop
us. We are masters in our nonviolent movement in disarming police forces; they
don't know what to do. I've seen them so often. I remember in Birmingham,
Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there, we would move out of the
16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by the hundreds we would move out.
And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth, and they did come; but
we just went before the dogs singing, "Ain't gonna let nobody turn me
around."
Bull Connor next would say,
"Turn the fire hoses on." And as I said to you the other night, Bull
Connor didn't know history. He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn't
relate to the transphysics that we knew about. And that was the fact that there
was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out. And we went before the
fire hoses; we had known water. If we were Baptist or some other denominations,
we had been immersed. If we were Methodist, and some others, we had been
sprinkled, but we knew water. That couldn't stop us.
And we just went on before the dogs
and we would look at them; and we'd go on before the water hoses and we would
look at it, and we'd just go on singing "Over my head I see freedom in the
air." And then we would be thrown in the paddy wagons, and sometimes we
were stacked in there like sardines in a can. And they would throw us in, and
old Bull would say, "Take 'em off," and they did; and we would just
go in the paddy wagon singing, "We Shall Overcome." And every now and
then we'd get in jail, and we'd see the jailers looking through the windows being
moved by our prayers, and being moved by our words and our songs. And there was
a power there which Bull Connor couldn't adjust to; and so we ended up
transforming Bull into a steer, and we won our struggle in Birmingham. Now
we've got to go on in Memphis just like that. I call upon you to be with us
when we go out Monday.
Now about injunctions: We have an
injunction and we're going into court tomorrow morning to fight this illegal,
unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America is, "Be true to what
you said on paper." If I lived in China or even Russia, or any
totalitarian country, maybe I could understand some of these illegal
injunctions. Maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First
Amendment privileges, because they hadn't committed themselves to that over
there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the
freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of press. Somewhere I read
that the greatness of America is the right to protest for right. And so just as
I say, we aren't going to let dogs or water hoses turn us around, we aren't
going to let any injunction turn us around. We are going on.
We need all of you. And you know what's beautiful to me is to see all of these
ministers of the Gospel. It's a marvelous picture. Who is it that is supposed
to articulate the longings and aspirations of the people more than the
preacher? Somehow the preacher must have a kind of fire shut up in his bones.
And whenever injustice is around he tell it. Somehow the preacher must be an Amos,
and saith, "When God speaks who can but prophesy?" Again with Amos,
"Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty
stream." Somehow the preacher must say with Jesus, "The Spirit of the
Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me," and he's anointed me to
deal with the problems of the poor."
And I want
to commend the preachers, under the leadership of these noble men: James
Lawson, one who has been in this struggle for many years; he's been to jail for
struggling; he's been kicked out of Vanderbilt University for this struggle,
but he's still going on, fighting for the rights of his people. Reverend Ralph
Jackson, Billy Kiles; I could just go right on down the list, but time will not
permit. But I want to thank all of them. And I want you to thank them, because
so often, preachers aren't concerned about anything but themselves. And I'm
always happy to see a relevant ministry.
It's all
right to talk about "long white robes over yonder," in all of its
symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear
down here! It's all right to talk about "streets flowing with milk and
honey," but God has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down
here, and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's all right
to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preacher must talk about
the new New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles,
the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do.
Now the
other thing we'll have to do is this: Always anchor our external direct action
with the power of economic withdrawal. Now, we are poor people. Individually,
we are poor when you compare us with white society in America. We are poor.
Never stop and forget that collectively -- that means all of us together --
collectively we are richer than all the nations in the world, with the
exception of nine. Did you ever think about that? After you leave the United
States, Soviet Russia, Great Britain, West Germany, France, and I could name
the others, the American Negro collectively is richer than most nations of the
world. We have an annual income of more than thirty billion dollars a year,
which is more than all of the exports of the United States, and more than the
national budget of Canada. Did you know that? That's power right there, if we
know how to pool it.
We don't
have to argue with anybody. We don't have to curse and go around acting bad
with our words. We don't need any bricks and bottles. We don't need any Molotov
cocktails. We just need to go around to these stores, and to these massive
industries in our country, and say, "God sent us by here, to say to you
that you're not treating his children right. And we've come by here to ask you
to make the first item on your agenda fair treatment, where God's children are
concerned. Now, if you are not prepared to do that, we do have an agenda that
we must follow. And our agenda calls for withdrawing economic support from
you."
And so, as
a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors
not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk.
Tell them not to buy -- what is the other bread? -- Wonder Bread. And what is
the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy Hart's bread. As Jesse
Jackson has said, up to now, only the garbage men have been feeling pain; now
we must kind of redistribute the pain. We are choosing these companies because
they haven't been fair in their hiring policies; and we are choosing them
because they can begin the process of saying they are going to support the
needs and the rights of these men who are on strike. And then they can move on
town -- downtown and tell Mayor Loeb to do what is right.
But not
only that, we've got to strengthen black institutions. I call upon you to take
your money out of the banks downtown and deposit your money in Tri-State Bank.
We want a "bank-in" movement in Memphis. Go by the savings and loan
association. I'm not asking you something that we don't do ourselves at SCLC.
Judge Hooks and others will tell you that we have an account here in the
savings and loan association from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
We are telling you to follow what we are doing. Put your money there. You have
six or seven black insurance companies here in the city of Memphis. Take out
your insurance there. We want to have an "insurance-in."
Now these
are some practical things that we can do. We begin the process of building a
greater economic base. And at the same time, we are putting pressure where it really
hurts. I ask you to follow through here.
Now, let me say as I move to my
conclusion that we've got to give ourselves to this struggle until the end.
Nothing would be more tragic than to stop at this point in Memphis. We've got
to see it through. And when we have our march, you need to be there. If it
means leaving work, if it means leaving school -- be there. Be concerned about
your brother. You may not be on strike. But either we go up together, or we go
down together.
Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness. One day a man came to Jesus,
and he wanted to raise some questions about some vital matters of life. At
points he wanted to trick Jesus, and show him that he knew a little more than
Jesus knew and throw him off base....
Now that question could have easily
ended up in a philosophical and theological debate. But Jesus immediately
pulled that question from mid-air, and placed it on a dangerous curve between
Jerusalem and Jericho. And he talked about a certain man, who fell among
thieves. You remember that a Levite and a priest passed by on the other side.
They didn't stop to help him. And finally a man of another race came by. He got
down from his beast, decided not to be compassionate by proxy. But he got down
with him, administered first aid, and helped the man in need. Jesus ended up
saying, this was the good man, this was the great man, because he had the
capacity to project the "I" into the "thou," and to be
concerned about his brother.
Now you know, we use our imagination
a great deal to try to determine why the priest and the Levite didn't stop. At
times we say they were busy going to a church meeting, an ecclesiastical
gathering, and they had to get on down to Jerusalem so they wouldn't be late
for their meeting. At other times we would speculate that there was a religious
law that "One who was engaged in religious ceremonials was not to touch a
human body twenty-four hours before the ceremony." And every now and then
we begin to wonder whether maybe they were not going down to Jerusalem -- or
down to Jericho, rather to organize a "Jericho Road Improvement
Association." That's a possibility. Maybe they felt that it was better to
deal with the problem from the causal root, rather than to get bogged down with
an individual effect.
But I'm going to tell you what my
imagination tells me. It's possible that those men were afraid. You see, the
Jericho road is a dangerous road. I remember when Mrs. King and I were first in
Jerusalem. We rented a car and drove from Jerusalem down to Jericho. And as
soon as we got on that road, I said to my wife, "I can see why Jesus used
this as the setting for his parable." It's a winding, meandering road.
It's really conducive for ambushing. You start out in Jerusalem, which is about
1200 miles -- or rather 1200 feet above sea level. And by the time you get down
to Jericho, fifteen or twenty minutes later, you're about 2200 feet below sea
level. That's a dangerous road. In the days of Jesus it came to be known as the
"Bloody Pass." And you know, it's possible that the priest and the
Levite looked over that man on the ground and wondered if the robbers were
still around. Or it's possible that they felt that the man on the ground was
merely faking. And he was acting like he had been robbed and hurt, in order to
seize them over there, lure them there for quick and easy seizure. And so the
first question that the priest asked -- the first question that the Levite
asked was, "If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?" But
then the Good Samaritan came by. And he reversed the question: "If I do
not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?"
That's the question before you
tonight. Not, "If I stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen
to my job. Not, "If I stop to help the sanitation workers what will happen
to all of the hours that I usually spend in my office every day and every week
as a pastor?" The question is not, "If I stop to help this man in
need, what will happen to me?" The question is, "If I do not stop to
help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?" That's the
question.
Let us rise up tonight with a greater readiness. Let us stand with a greater
determination. And let us move on in these powerful days, these days of
challenge to make America what it ought to be. We have an opportunity to make
America a better nation. And I want to thank God, once more, for allowing me to
be here with you.
You know, several years ago, I was
in New York City autographing the first book that I had written. And while
sitting there autographing books, a demented black woman came up. The only
question I heard from her was, "Are you Martin Luther King?" And I
was looking down writing, and I said, "Yes." And the next minute I
felt something beating on my chest. Before I knew it I had been stabbed by this
demented woman. I was rushed to Harlem Hospital. It was a dark Saturday
afternoon. And that blade had gone through, and the X-rays revealed that the
tip of the blade was on the edge of my aorta, the main artery. And once that's
punctured, your drowned in your own blood -- that's the end of you.
It came out in the New York Times the next morning, that if I
had merely sneezed, I would have died. Well, about four days later, they
allowed me, after the operation, after my chest had been opened, and the blade
had been taken out, to move around in the wheel chair in the hospital. They
allowed me to read some of the mail that came in, and from all over the states
and the world, kind letters came in. I read a few, but one of them I will never
forget. I had received one from the President and the Vice-President. I've
forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit and a letter from the
Governor of New York, but I've forgotten what that letter said. But there was
another letter that came from a little girl, a young girl who was a student at
the White Plains High School. And I looked at that letter, and I'll never forget
it. It said simply,
Dear Dr. King,
I am a ninth-grade student at the
White Plains High School."
And she said,
While it should not matter, I would
like to mention that I'm a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune,
and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died.
And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze.
And I want to say tonight -- I want
to say tonight that I too am happy that I didn't sneeze. Because if I had
sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1960, when students all over the
South started sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were
sitting in, they were really standing up for the best in the American dream,
and taking the whole nation back to those great wells of democracy which were
dug deep by the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence and the
Constitution.
If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have
been around here in 1961, when we decided to take a ride for freedom and ended
segregation in inter-state travel.
If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have
been around here in 1962, when Negroes in Albany, Georgia, decided to
straighten their backs up. And whenever men and women straighten their backs
up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is
bent.
If I had sneezed -- If I had sneezed
I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham,
Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation, and brought into being the
Civil Rights Bill.
If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have
had a chance later that year, in August, to try to tell America about a dream
that I had had.
If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have
been down in Selma, Alabama, to see the great Movement there.
If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have
been in Memphis to see a community rally around those brothers and sisters who
are suffering.
I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze.
And they were telling me --. Now, it
doesn't matter, now. It really doesn't matter what happens now. I left Atlanta
this morning, and as we got started on the plane, there were six of us. The
pilot said over the public address system, "We are sorry for the delay,
but we have Dr. Martin Luther King on the plane. And to be sure that all of the
bags were checked, and to be sure that nothing would be wrong with on the
plane, we had to check out everything carefully. And we've had the plane
protected and guarded all night."
And then I got into Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the
threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white
brothers?
Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead.
But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the
mountaintop.
And I don't mind.
Like anybody, I would like to live a
long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I
just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And
I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with
you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the
promised land!
And so I'm happy, tonight.
I'm not worried about anything.
I'm not fearing any man!
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the
coming of the Lord!!
