“Precision and accuracy are necessary for both white and black writers. ‘A black aesthetic’ should not be an excuse for sloppy writing.” — poet and publisher Dudley Randall

“How else can a black writer write than out of his black experience? Yet what we tend to overlook is that our common humanity makes it possible to write a love poem, for instance, without a word of race, or to write a nationalistic poem that will be valid for all humanity.” — Dudley Randall

It’s his birthday today.

Lots of people have a sense of mission but don’t do anything about it. The mission remains theoretical, empty words. The person gets discouraged or “stopped” when the outer world says “No thanks, we don’t need that.” Dudley Randall’s sense of mission was his guiding star. He wanted to create opportunities for other black writers, he wanted to create a platform for non-mainstream voices. And he did. What is even more extraordinary: what Randall created still exists today. It’s a continuum.

Dudley Randall was the son of a preacher and a teacher. These professions were guiding examples to him, they infused everything he did – his sense of mission, again. He started writing poetry very young, and was also published very young (at 13 years old). He graduated from high school early. He got his degree at Wayne State, and then went on to get a Master’s in library science. (Let’s hear it for librarians.) He served in the South Pacific in WWII. He learned many languages and traveled widely. He was fluent in Russian, and took on translating many Russian works into English. He held down a job as a librarian all this time. He wrote poetry about life as he saw it around him, auto workers in Detroit, bag ladies, church people, the downtrodden, the flashy.

But Randall’s real legacy (which, of course, came out of his own poetry, but expanded into something much bigger) is his founding of Broadside Press in 1963. He ran the press out of his own home, with limited to no funds. He ran the press for 20 years before selling it. It continues in existence today. It’s never once stopped. (You can read the story of Broadside Press – and look at the archives – here.) Randall’s Broadside Press – similar to Harriet Monroe’s Poetry magazine – was the first to publish many poets who couldn’t get published elsewhere, their work didn’t “fit” with what the big-wig mags wanted. Many of the poets first published by Broadside would go on to do great things. Nikki Giovanni called Broadside a “midwife” to the black poetry movement.

Over the course of Randall’s tenure, Broadside published over 60 books. Poetry volumes, criticism, memoirs, you name it. Authors who got their start there did not forget what Randall had done. When Gwendolyn Brooks wrote her autobiography, she chose Broadside as her publisher (even though she was offered much more money from bigger publishing houses).

Randall became Detroit’s first poet laureate. There are scholarships issued under his name, buildings named for him.

Here are two of Randall’s poems. The first is, of course, about the assassination of President Kennedy. It’s a heart-breaker. The second is about the bombing of the church in Birmingham, Alabama. Randall felt strongly about the importance of black experience but he also felt very strongly about the universality of art, and how those things were not mutually exclusive:

Dressed All in Pink

It was a wet and cloudy day
When the Prince took his last ride
The Prince rode with the governor
And his Princess rode beside.

“And would you like to ride inside
For shelter from the rain?”
“No, I’ll ride outside
Where I can wave and speak to my friends again.”

The Prince rides with the governor
His Princess rides beside
Dressed all in pink
As delicate as roses of a bride

Pink as a rose the princess rides
But bullets from a gun
Turn that pink to as deep a red
As red red blood can run

For she stoops to where the Prince lies still
And cradles his shattered head
And there that pink so delicate
Is stained a deep deep red

The Prince rides with the governor
The Princess rides beside
And her dress of pink so delicate
A deep deep red is dyed.

Ballad of Birmingham

(On the bombing of a church in Birmingham, Alabama, 1963)

“Mother dear, may I go downtown
Instead of out to play,
And march the streets of Birmingham
In a Freedom March today?”

“No, baby, no, you may not go,
For the dogs are fierce and wild,
And clubs and hoses, guns and jails
Aren’t good for a little child.”

“But, mother, I won’t be alone.
Other children will go with me,
And march the streets of Birmingham
To make our country free.”

“No, baby, no, you may not go,
For I fear those guns will fire.
But you may go to church instead
And sing in the children’s choir.”

She has combed and brushed her night-dark hair,
And bathed rose petal sweet,
And drawn white gloves on her small brown hands,
And white shoes on her feet.

The mother smiled to know her child
Was in the sacred place,
But that smile was the last smile
To come upon her face.

For when she heard the explosion,
Her eyes grew wet and wild.
She raced through the streets of Birmingham
Calling for her child.

She clawed through bits of glass and brick,
Then lifted out a shoe.
“O, here’s the shoe my baby wore,
But, baby, where are you?”

“My strongest motivations have been to get good black poets published, to produce beautiful books, help create and define the soul of black folk, and to know the joy of discovering new poets.” – Dudley Randall