paul laurence dunbar's poem, "mask," and my own poem, "for old black men." mr. dunbar wrote "mask" in 1892. we wear the mask that grins and lies, it shades our cheeks and hides our eyes, this debt we pay to human guile. with torn and bleeding hearts we smile, and mouth with myriad subtleties. why should the world be otherwise, in counting all our tears and sighs? nay, let them only see us, while we wear the mask. we smile, but oh my god, our tears to thee from tortured souls arise. and we sing, "hey, baby-bye," we sing, but oh, the clay is vile beneath our feet, and long the mile. but let the world think otherwise, we wear the mask! when i think about myself, i almost laugh myself to death. my life has been one great big joke, a dance that's walked a song was spoke, i laugh so hard i almost choke when i think about myself. seventy years in these folks' world the child i works for calls me girl. i say "ha! ha! ha! yes ma'am!" for workin's sake i'm too proud to bend and too poor to break so i laugh until my stomach aches when i think about myself. my folks can make

and you would see this thing that happened, this mask, or these masks, and paul laurence dunbar helped me to understand that. >> with that poem? >> with the poem -- "we wear the mask that grins and lies. it shades our cheeks and hides our eyes, this debt we pay to human guile. with torn and bleeding hearts we smile, and mouth myriad subtleties. why should the world be over-wise, in counting all our tears and sighs? nay, let them only see us, while we wear the masks." people used to come into the store and they'd say, "oh, sister henderson, it's just awful today. it's just terrible. i can't stand it. it's killing me, this heat," or this cold, and my grandmother would say, "uh hum. yes ma'am." and as soon as the people would leave, she would call me and she'd say, "sister, did you just hear that sister murphy said?" or "brother thompson said?" and i said, "yes, ma'am." she turned and her eyes would get like stones. she'd say "sister, there are people all over this planet who went to sleep last night when sister murphy went to sleep, who will never wake again. their beds have become their

identify with them as though they did things between what was with you in on the page was paul laurence dunbar "-close-double-quote as ms. baldwin calls it a special attitude which means that you look at shakespeare and you already see that you are not a part of it so what he sees is that to take take a special the special attitude and then in many ways use the imagination and the possibility to put yourself there. what happens and this is in some ways what gave birth to funk music. if we are not included in this and they don't expect people to play instruments what if we just came from the mothership and we landed here in the bay area and they had a bass guitar that even though you're not included in the special attitude were often it is to stay to bring bob marley back in some ways he has this idea that if you are a big tree we will cut you down. the idea is the special attitude you can cut it down so you're not included comments were not there the church of at the church of the writer at least in my reading is to appropriate that special attitude can use it as a way to interrogate yourself