At the Spring Dawn

At the Spring Dawn

By Angelina Weld Grimké

I watched the dawn come,

    Watched the spring dawn come.

And the red sun shouldered his way up

    Through the grey, through the blue,

Through the lilac mists.

The quiet of it! The goodness of it!

    And one bird awoke, sang, whirred

A blur of moving black against the sun,

    Sang again—afar off.

And I stretched my arms to the redness of the sun,

    Stretched to my finger tips,

        And I laughed.

Ah! It is good to be alive, good to love,

    At the dawn,

        At the spring dawn.

Angelina Weld Grimké, born in Boston, on February 27, 1880, was a journalist, playwright, and poet from the Harlem Renaissance. Her work was collected in several Harlem Renaissance anthologies, including Negro Poets and Their Poems (The Associated Publishers, 1923) and The New Negro (Atheneum, 1925). She died on June 10, 1958.