Nikki Giovanni gained widespread popularity during the 1960s for her revolutionary poems. She has made her poems accessible to a multi-generational and international audience through public readings in universities and bestselling recordings accompanied by gospel music. Nikki Giovanni’s major works include Black Feeling, Black Talk (1967); Black Judgement (1968); My House (1972); Those Who Ride the Night Winds (1983), and Racism 101 (1994). This paper traces Giovanni’s evolution as a poet and analyzes her shift from a revolutionary militant voice to a more domestic and mellowed voice and the sensibility she creates through her poems.

The late 1960s found Nikki Giovanni at her violent best. This period captured her militancy based on her love for the blacks as individuals and hatred for the whites as a race. But over the years, she changed from being an outspoken militant to a more subdued poet. In “You Came, Too,” from Black Feeling, Black Talk, Giovanni (1970) talks about people who confused by politics find solace in love:

I came to the crowd seeking friends
I came to the crowd seeking love
I came to the crowd for understanding
I found you
I came to the crowd to weep
I came to the crowd to laugh
You dried my tears
You shared my happiness. (1-8)

What Giovanni laments is the loss of love in the search for revolution that is caused by stress, hatred, and violence. The poem can also be seen as Giovanni’s own sense of loss. Though her words articulate her support for the blacks and bring out her aspiration, they do portray a picture of Giovanni as completely lonely. Despite her utmost contribution as a woman writer, her life has been devoid of happiness, love, and security. The poem suggests her longing and search for someone who will understand her and be there for her. The fourth line of the poem indicates that she has found that someone who, in the latter part, is said to have dried her tears and shared her happiness.

American Literature Journal, Amor in Pound, Classical European Literature, Homosexuality, Diastasis, Olga-Circe-Artemis, Heterosexual Love, Homosexual Love.