| James Weldon Johnson, ed. (1871–1938). The Book of American Negro Poetry. 1922. |
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| Sonnet |
| | | Alice Dunbar-Nelson |
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| I HAD no thought of violets of late, | |
| The wild, shy kind that spring beneath your feet | |
| In wistful April days, when lovers mate | |
| And wander through the fields in raptures sweet. | |
| The thought of violets meant florists’ shops, | 5 |
| And bows and pins, and perfumed papers fine; | |
| And garish lights, and mincing little fops | |
| And cabarets and songs, and deadening wine. | |
| So far from sweet real things my thoughts had strayed, | |
| I had forgot wide fields, and clear brown streams; | 10 |
| The perfect loveliness that God has made,— | |
| Wild violets shy and Heaven-mounting dreams. | |
| And now—unwittingly, you’ve made me dream | |
| Of violets, and my soul’s forgotten gleam. | |
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