I’ve stayed in the front yard all my life. <br />I want a peek at the back <br />Where it’s rough and untended and hungry weed grows. <br />A girl gets sick of a rose. <br /> <br />I want to go in the back yard now <br />And maybe down the alley, <br />To where the charity children play. <br />I want a good time today. <br /> <br />They do some wonderful things. <br />They have some wonderful fun. <br />My mother sneers, but I say it’s fine <br />How they don’t have to go in at quarter to nine. <br />My mother, she tells me that Johnnie Mae <br />Will grow up to be a bad woman. <br />That George’ll be taken to Jail soon or late <br />(On account of last winter he sold our back gate). <br /> <br />But I say it’s fine. Honest, I do. <br />And I’d like to be a bad woman, too, <br />And wear the brave stockings of night-black lace <br />And strut down the streets with paint on my face.<br /><br />Gwendolyn Brooks<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-song-in-the-front-yard/
