The sheriff and his "well-armed riff-raff" represent the "tens" that come to reinforce white supremacy. In the tradition of Crispus Attucks McKoy and Wild Bill (both to be seen in Brown’s last collection), the Union member stands against overwhelming numbers and thus gives his life for larger and more important principles. In stating "We gonna clean out dis brushwood round here soon, / Plant de white-oak and de black-oak side by side," the Union member reveals a vision of racial solidarity that would ultimately resolve the tension of the era.

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From Afro-Modernist Aesthetics and the Poetry of Sterling A. Brown. Copyright © 1999 by the University of Georgia Press