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Sympathy: Poem By Paul Lawrence Dunbar
Contributed by Davina Drabkin

  • TOP HAGGADAHS FOR 2023

As we begin our tale of bitter slavery, we draw on the moving words of the 1899 poem of Paul Laurence Dunbar. Inspiration for Maya Angelou’s poem and autobiographical novel, Dunbar’s words recall the Torah narrative of our ancestors crying to the Almighty with pain and anguish, triggering the beginning of the redemption. The poem speaks about brutal slavery, racial segregation, and social discrimination practiced in American society against the African-American community. Using the metaphor of a bird, Dunbar highlights the importance of freedom. He also describes captivity through the plea and struggle of a caged bird.

Sympathy  

BY PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR

I know what the caged bird feels, alas!

    When the sun is bright on the upland slopes;   

When the wind stirs soft through the springing grass,   

And the river flows like a stream of glass;

    When the first bird sings and the first bud opes,   

And the faint perfume from its chalice steals—

I know what the caged bird feels!

I know why the caged bird beats his wing

    Till its blood is red on the cruel bars;   

For he must fly back to his perch and cling   

When he fain would be on the bough a-swing;

    And a pain still throbs in the old, old scars   

And they pulse again with a keener sting—

I know why he beats his wing!

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,

    When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,—

When he beats his bars and he would be free;

It is not a carol of joy or glee,

    But a prayer that he sends from his heart’s deep core,   

But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings—

I know why the caged bird sings!

Discuss: current world slavery and our Jewish obligation to grapple with the African American slave experience.  Poem Analysis
haggadah Section: Introduction

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