South

The lazy, laughing South

With blood on its mouth

The sunny-faced South,

          Beast-strong

          idiot-brained.

The child-minded South

Scratching in the dead fire's ashes

For a Negro's bones

          Cotton and the moon,

          Warmth, earth, warmth,

          The sky, the sun, the stars

          The magnolia-scented South.

Beautiful, like a woman,

Seductive as a dark-eyed whore,

          Passionate, cruel,

          Honey-lipped, syphilitic - 

          That is the South.

And I, who am black, would love her

But she turns her back upon me.

           So now I seek the North - 

           The cold-faced North,

            For she, they say,

            Is a kinder mistress,

And in her house my children

May escape the spell of the South

Tamara Stratford's questions:

1) Can you tell me what this poem means?

2) Is this poem referring to a black and a white woman?

3) Does this poem reflect anything about the days of racial discrimmination?  ( Slave master, plantation, etc.)