"For the cramped bewildered years
we went to school to learn
to know the reasons why
and the answers to and the people who
and the places where and the days when,
in memory of the bitter hours
when we discovered
we were black and poor and small and different
and nobody cared and nobody wondered
and nobody understood . . . "

–For My People by Margaret Walker

Born in 1915 in Birmingham, Alabama, Margaret Walker is one of the most talented poets to come out of the American South and one of the most powerful voices of America. "When she speaks of and for her people, older voices are mixed with hers-the voices of Methodist forebears and preachers who preached the Word, the anonymous voices of many who lived and were forgotten and yet out of bondage and hope made a lasting music," wrote Stephen Vincent Benet.

To illustrate Margaret Walker's best‑known poem, For My People, Elizabeth Catlett has created six multi-colored lithographs. Beautiful and striking, Catlett's images borrow from the African tradition of using form to communicate spirit and purpose.