Claude McKay

The tropics in New York

Bananas ripe and green, and ginger-root,
Cocoa in pods and alligator pears,
And tangerines and mangoes and grape fruit,
Fit for the highest prize at parish fairs,

Set in the window, bringing memories
Of fruit-trees laden by low-singing rills,
And dewy dawns, and mystical blue skies
In in benediction over nun-light hills.

My eyes grew dim? And I could no more zaxe,
A wave of longing through my body swept,
Nd, hungry for the old familiar ways,
I turned aside and bowed my head and wept/