Stephen Rose's Poem 'The Stones Cried Out'

In our cultural the task of gaining freedom is never easy to obtain. Stephen Rose, in his poem ‘The Stones Cried Out’, states, ‘How long will it be till a voice of liberty can speak so free’. The quote reflects on how long will it be till a brave prophet of the African- American community will testify their freedom with a voice of no chains or restraints openly without regard. This poem relates to the historical activist Martin Luther King Jr who was above all else a voice of liberty within the American-American community aiming for his people to have Equal rights. Furthermore, the journey during the Civil Rights did not go without tears and blood. ‘The stones Cried Out’ carries the tone of loss and wonderment on the Civil Rights and activist Martin Luther King Jr which will be summarize and shown relations to the poem.

The Civil Rights Moment in mainly the early 1960s witnessed a great deal of

First Quatrain Figuratively “Felt the brush of an angel's wing” (2) indicates while he stood upon the balcony in a spiritual sense he time was near. It was a well know fact King was not afraid to lose he life to the cause of gaining more equal rights for his people. The angel could also be related to fact of past assignation attempts on his person that were close calls. Rose use one of King most memorable line for his Freedom Speech with a twist at the beginning and the end “Cried let freedom ring” (3) “And the stones cried out” (4) Which King himself cried out “Freedom ring’’ those words during his speech and the people who were gathered can be seen as the literary devices as the stones since they were crying it. Whenever you heard King giving a speech the gathering usually described as a sense of the emotional level of a Bible service to most people who in this poem are viewed as stones listening to his word “Testimony of the stones”