Poem: In Texas Grass by Quincy Troupe

   All along the rail
                                road tracks of texas
                               old train cars lay
                               rusted &overturned
                              like new african governments
                             long forgotten by the people
                              who built & rode them
                                till they couldn't run no more,
                              they remind me of old race horses
                             who've been put out to pasture
                            amongst the weeds
                            rain sleet &snow
                            till they die,rot away
                            like photos fading
                           in grandma's picture book,
                         of old black men in mississippi/texas
                         who sit on dilapidated porches,
                        that fall away
                       like dead man's skin,
                      like white people's eyes
                     &on the peeling photos,
                      old men sit sad -eyed
                      waiting,waiting for
                       worm dust,thinking of
                    the master&his long forgotten promise
                   of 40 acres & a mule,
                    & even now,if you pass across
                    the bleeding flesh ever-
                     changing landscape,
                     you will see the fruited
                     countryside, stretching, stretching,
                    old black men,&young black men
                      sitting on  porches
                      waiting, waiting for rusted
                     trains in texas grass