Bitter Fruit

People of all colors will always wonder about the sad and unfortunate death against racism in American’s history. A poem called, “Bitter Fruit” also known as “Strange Fruit” is perhaps one of the greatest poem and song ever written to protest the hatred of discrimination. This poem was written by a Jewish male teacher named Abel Meeropol, who was inspired by a haunted photographic picture of Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith being lynched in Marron. After seeing an image of the lynch, Meeropol was deeply disturbed which explained how the photo “Haunted” him “for days” (Blair). This portrait made Meeropol opened his eyes to display the ugly truth about the horrors that African-Americans experienced through the abolition. After he was inspired to

According to “History of Lynchings” stated, “From 1882-1968, 4,743 lynchings occurred in the United States. Of these people that were lynched 3,446 were black. The blacks lynched accounted for 72.7% of the people lynched.” (NAACP). This quote reflects the song “Strange Fruit” because black people who were lynched had a higher rate than other race in the History of United States. This proves evidence that white people who are racist only wanted to lynch blacks for no reason. This connection to the part when Billie said, “For the Sun to rot / for the tree to drop / here is a Strange and Bitter Crop”. After time pass by, the hanging bodies would rot on their rope from the sun until eventually the body would fall apart and drop to the grass below. This part is like a metaphor because trees drop their fruit when they ripen. This part of the quote also lead to no one can stop them as they watch more black people get lynch. The person who tries to make a change would be the next person to be

According to “History of Lynchings” stated, “Out of the 4,743 people lynched only 1,297 white people were lynched. That is only 27.3%. Many of the whites lynched were lynched for helping the black or being anti-lynching and even for domestic crimes.”. (NAACP). This quote supports the outside of the box idea of some white people who were not part of the Ku Klux Klan want to help black people or end the murder because they did not like the way of KKK’s ideas. This connects to the outer thought of the song because not all white wanted to lynch African-American. If some white keep helping the blacks, the white people who were helping them would be afraid that they were going to be the next person in line to be