April 6, 2026 • 12 mins
Class is taking a spring break and will be back with our regular programming on April 20th. For now, enjoy a moment of seasonal poetry with a few comrades across time and space: Rosa Luxemburg, Bertolt Brecht, Langston Hughes, and Ada Limón. Happy early Earth Day and May Day, listeners!
Read on this episode:
- Rosa Luxemburg’s letters to Hans Diefenbach, March 30, 1917 & Sophie Liebkecht, May 2, 1917
- Bertolt Brecht, "Morning Address to a Tree Named Green" (1927) & "Spring 1938" (1938). These are casual links for convenience; official English translations for these aren’t readily available online.
- Langston Hughes, “An Earth Song” (1925)
- Ada Limón, “Instructions on Not Giving Up” (2017), republished in The Carrying (2021)
Become a member of Democratic Socialists of America.
Sign up to receive NPEC's newsletter, Red Letter.
Listen
Watch
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
Hi comrades, I'm Michaela, the current chair of
DSA's National PoliticalEducation Committee, or NPEC,
and a member of North New JerseyDSA.
We're going to take a coupleweeks off from our regular class
programming and we'll be back onthe air at the end of the month.
But hold on, before you go, I'mgoing to read some springtime
socialist poetry and letters.
(00:26):
Spring is meaningful forsocialists.
May Day is a traditional holidayfor many northern cultures
celebrating the movement ofspring into summer, and it's our
adopted day for celebrating ourmovement and working class
struggle internationally.
Spring is a time of emergenceand growth, shifting from
darkness into light.
But it isn't also without itsmoods and reflections.
(00:49):
What I have selected here aresome excerpts and poems by a few
comrades past, and onecontemporary poem that just
fits.
It was hard to pick just a few.
I hope you'll enjoy listeningand that they'll remind you that
as hard as the winter is, ashard as our struggle in the
midst of darkness can feel,there is life, love, and beauty
(01:09):
emergent in our world, and we'refighting for it to flourish
everywhere for everyone.
Happy early Earth Day and HappyEarly May Day.
Before we dive in, a reminderthat class is available on all
major podcast platforms.
Please consider becoming a DSAmember by following the link in
the podcast description.
You can also send us a messageabout the episode and sign up
(01:32):
for Red Letter, NPEC's MonthlyNewsletter, using the provided
links.
Rosa Luxemburg to HansDeifenbach, March 30th, 1917.
I have never experienced aspring as consciously and fully
as the one last year at thistime.
Maybe that's because it cameafter a year in cell 69, or
(01:54):
because I now know every bushand every blade of grass
intimately, and so can followthe unfolding and find detail.
Do you remember how only a fewyears ago in Zudende we tried to
guess the identity of a yellowflowering shrub?
You proposed that we accept itas laburnum, but of course it
was no such thing.
(02:14):
How glad I am that three yearsago I suddenly plunged into the
study of botany the way I doeverything, with all my fire and
passion, with my entire being,so that the world, the party,
and my work ceased to exist forme, and only one passion
possessed me day and night.
To be outdoors roaming about thespringtime fields, gathering
(02:35):
armfuls of plants, returninghome to sort them, identify
them, and put them between thepages of my notebooks.
I lived through the wholespringtime then as though in a
fever.
How I suffered when I sat infront of a new little plant and
was unable for a long time toidentify or classify it.
Many times I almost fainted sothat Gertrude became cross and
(02:57):
threatened to take the plantsaway from me.
But now, in recompense, I'm athome in the green realm of
plants.
I've conquered it, taken it bystorm with passion, and anything
you grasp with fervor takes rootinside you.
Last spring I had a partner inthese wanderings, Karl
Liebnecht.
Perhaps you know how he'd beenliving for many years past,
(03:18):
always busy with parliaments,sessions, commissions,
discussions, always harried andstressed, always leaping from
the train to the electric tramand from the tram into a cab,
all his pockets crammed withnotepads, his arms full of
freshly purchased newspapers,which he could not possibly have
found time to read, his body andsoul covered with the dust of
the street, and yet all thewhile with an amiable, youthful
(03:41):
smile on his lips.
Last spring I forced him to stopfor a while, to remember that
there is a world beyond theReichstag and the Landtag.
And on several occasions hestrolled with Sonia and me in
the fields and the botanicalgardens.
He could take a childish delightin the sight of a birch tree
with its young catkins.
Once we trekked right across thefields to Marenfeld.
(04:04):
You know that route?
Remember?
We went that way together oneautumn and had to walk through
stubble.
But last April with Carl, it wasin the morning, and the fields
were a fresh green from thewinter sowing.
A warm wind was chasing greyclouds this way and that across
the sky in fits and starts.
And one moment the fields weresparkling in bright sunshine,
(04:25):
and the next moment theydarkened to an emerald green in
the shadows.
It was a magnificent display aswe walked along in silence.
Suddenly Carl stopped and beganleaping about strangely and with
a serious expression on hisface.
I looked at him in astonishmentand was even a little alarmed.
What's the matter with you?
I asked.
He merely answered, I'm soblissfully happy.
(04:48):
At which, of course, we fellabout laughing.
Rosa to Sophie Leibnicht, May2nd, 1917.
Do you remember how in Aprillast year I called you up on the
telephone at 10 in the morningto come at once to the botanical
gardens and listen to thenightingale, which was giving a
regular concert there?
We hid ourselves in a thickshrubbery and sat on the stones
(05:11):
beside a trickling streamlet.
When the nightingale had ceasedsinging, there suddenly came a
plaintive, monotonous cry thatsounded something like glick
glick glick glick.
I said I thought it must be somekind of marsh bird, and Carl
agreed, but we never learnedexactly which bird it was.
Just fancy.
I heard the same call suddenlyhere from somewhere close at
(05:33):
hand a few days ago in the earlymorning.
And I burned with impatience tofind out what the bird was.
I could not rest until I'd doneso.
But it is not a marsh bird,after all.
It is a rhineck, a grey birdlarger than a sparrow.
It gets its name because of theway in which, when danger
threatens, it tries tointimidate its enemies by quaint
(05:54):
gestures and writhings of theneck.
It lives only on ants,collecting them with its sticky
tongue, just like an anteater.
The Spaniards call itHormiguero, the ant bird.
Mordeque has written someamusing verses on the rhineck,
and Ugo Wolf has set them tomusic.
Now that I found out what birdit is that gave the plaintiff
(06:15):
cry, I'm so pleased as ifsomeone had given me a present.
You might write to Carl aboutit.
He will like to know.
You ask what I am reading.
Natural science for the mostpart.
I am studying the distributionof plants and animals.
Yesterday I was reading aboutthe reasons for the
disappearance of songbirds inGermany.
The spread of scientificforestry, horticulture, and
(06:37):
agriculture have cut them offfrom their nesting places and
their food supply.
More and more, with modernmethods, we're doing away with
hollow trees, wastelands,brushwood, fallen leaves.
I feel sore at heart.
I was not thinking so much aboutthe loss of pleasure for human
beings, but I was so muchdistressed at the idea of the
stealthy and inexorabledestruction of these defenseless
(07:00):
little creatures that the tearscame into my eyes.
I suppose I must be out of sortsto feel everything so deeply.
Sometimes, however, it seems tome that I am not really a human
being at all, but like a bird ora beast in human form.
I feel so much more at home,even in the scrap of garden like
the one here, and still more inthe meadows when the grass is
(07:23):
humming with bees than at one ofour party congresses.
I can say that to you, for youwill not promptly suspect me of
treason to socialism.
You know I really hope to die atmy post in a street fighter in
prison.
But my innermost personalitybelongs more to my tomtits than
to the comrades.
Bertolt Bracht, morning addressto a tree named Green, 1927.
(07:47):
Green, I owe you an apology.
I couldn't sleep last nightbecause of the noise of the
storm.
When I looked out, I noticed youswaying like a drunken ape.
I remarked on it.
Today this yellow sun is shiningin your bare branches.
You're shaking off a few tearsstill, Green, but now you know
your own worth.
(08:08):
You have fought the bitterestfight of your life.
Vultures were taking an interestin you.
And now I know it's only by yourinexorable flexibility that you
were still upright this morning.
In view of your success, it's myopinion today.
It was no mean feat to grow upso tall in between the
(08:28):
tenements, so tall, green, thatthe storm can get at you as it
did last night.
Langston Hughes, Earth Song,1925.
It's an earth song.
And I've been waiting long foran earth song.
It's a spring song.
And I've been waiting long for aspring song.
(08:51):
Strong as the shoots of a newplant.
Strong as the bursting of newbuds.
Strong as the coming of thefirst child from its mother's
womb.
It's an earth song.
A body song.
A spring song.
I have been waiting long forthis spring song.
(09:16):
Today, Easter Sunday morning, asudden snowstorm swept over the
island.
Between the greening hedges laysnow.
My young son drew me to thelittle apricot tree by the house
wall, away from a verse in whichI pointed the finger at those
who were preparing a war whichcould well wipe out the
(09:39):
continent, this island, mypeople, my family, and myself.
In silence, we put a stack overthe freezing tree.
And I should note that the waythat this looks on a page is
like a tree.
Ada Lamon instructions on notgiving up.
(10:02):
2018.
More than the fuchsia funnelsbreaking out of the crab apple
tree, more than the neighbor'salmost obscene display of cherry
limbs shoving their cottoncandy-colored blossoms to the
slate sky of spring rains.
It's the greening of the treesthat really gets to me.
When all the shock of white andtaffy, the world's baubles and
(10:25):
trinkets, leave the pavementstrewn with the confetti of
aftermath, the leaves come.
Patient, plodding, a green skingrowing over whatever winter did
to us.
A return to the strange idea ofcontinuous living despite the
mess of us, the hurt, the empty.
(10:47):
Fine then.
I'll take it, the tree seems tosay.
A new slick leaf unfurling likea fist to an open palm.
I'll take it all.
Thanks as always to ourproduction crew, Emma, Michael,
and Tim, who put this alltogether.
Class is a podcast of DSA'sNational Political Education
(11:09):
Committee, or NPEC, which worksto expand the knowledge of DSA
members and non-members in theservice of winning the struggle
for socialism and democracy.
You can find out more about NPECby searching for us online or
following us on social media,but the best way to find out
what our committee's up to is bysigning up for Red Letter,
NPEC's monthly newsletter.
And if you aren't already, youcan become a DSA member by
(11:31):
following the link in thepodcast description.
Okay, until next time,Solidarity.
Hi comrades, I'm Michaela, the current chair of
DSA's National PoliticalEducation Committee, or NPEC,
and a member of North New JerseyDSA.
We're going to take a coupleweeks off from our regular class
programming and we'll be back onthe air at the end of the month.
But hold on, before you go, I'mgoing to read some springtime
socialist poetry and letters.
(00:26):
Spring is meaningful forsocialists.
May Day is a traditional holidayfor many northern cultures
celebrating the movement ofspring into summer, and it's our
adopted day for celebrating ourmovement and working class
struggle internationally.
Spring is a time of emergenceand growth, shifting from
darkness into light.
But it isn't also without itsmoods and reflections.
(00:49):
What I have selected here aresome excerpts and poems by a few
comrades past, and onecontemporary poem that just
fits.
It was hard to pick just a few.
I hope you'll enjoy listeningand that they'll remind you that
as hard as the winter is, ashard as our struggle in the
midst of darkness can feel,there is life, love, and beauty
(01:09):
emergent in our world, and we'refighting for it to flourish
everywhere for everyone.
Happy early Earth Day and HappyEarly May Day.
Before we dive in, a reminderthat class is available on all
major podcast platforms.
Please consider becoming a DSAmember by following the link in
the podcast description.
You can also send us a messageabout the episode and sign up
(01:32):
for Red Letter, NPEC's MonthlyNewsletter, using the provided
links.
Rosa Luxemburg to HansDeifenbach, March 30th, 1917.
I have never experienced aspring as consciously and fully
as the one last year at thistime.
Maybe that's because it cameafter a year in cell 69, or
(01:54):
because I now know every bushand every blade of grass
intimately, and so can followthe unfolding and find detail.
Do you remember how only a fewyears ago in Zudende we tried to
guess the identity of a yellowflowering shrub?
You proposed that we accept itas laburnum, but of course it
was no such thing.
(02:14):
How glad I am that three yearsago I suddenly plunged into the
study of botany the way I doeverything, with all my fire and
passion, with my entire being,so that the world, the party,
and my work ceased to exist forme, and only one passion
possessed me day and night.
To be outdoors roaming about thespringtime fields, gathering
(02:35):
armfuls of plants, returninghome to sort them, identify
them, and put them between thepages of my notebooks.
I lived through the wholespringtime then as though in a
fever.
How I suffered when I sat infront of a new little plant and
was unable for a long time toidentify or classify it.
Many times I almost fainted sothat Gertrude became cross and
(02:57):
threatened to take the plantsaway from me.
But now, in recompense, I'm athome in the green realm of
plants.
I've conquered it, taken it bystorm with passion, and anything
you grasp with fervor takes rootinside you.
Last spring I had a partner inthese wanderings, Karl
Liebnecht.
Perhaps you know how he'd beenliving for many years past,
(03:18):
always busy with parliaments,sessions, commissions,
discussions, always harried andstressed, always leaping from
the train to the electric tramand from the tram into a cab,
all his pockets crammed withnotepads, his arms full of
freshly purchased newspapers,which he could not possibly have
found time to read, his body andsoul covered with the dust of
the street, and yet all thewhile with an amiable, youthful
(03:41):
smile on his lips.
Last spring I forced him to stopfor a while, to remember that
there is a world beyond theReichstag and the Landtag.
And on several occasions hestrolled with Sonia and me in
the fields and the botanicalgardens.
He could take a childish delightin the sight of a birch tree
with its young catkins.
Once we trekked right across thefields to Marenfeld.
(04:04):
You know that route?
Remember?
We went that way together oneautumn and had to walk through
stubble.
But last April with Carl, it wasin the morning, and the fields
were a fresh green from thewinter sowing.
A warm wind was chasing greyclouds this way and that across
the sky in fits and starts.
And one moment the fields weresparkling in bright sunshine,
(04:25):
and the next moment theydarkened to an emerald green in
the shadows.
It was a magnificent display aswe walked along in silence.
Suddenly Carl stopped and beganleaping about strangely and with
a serious expression on hisface.
I looked at him in astonishmentand was even a little alarmed.
What's the matter with you?
I asked.
He merely answered, I'm soblissfully happy.
(04:48):
At which, of course, we fellabout laughing.
Rosa to Sophie Leibnicht, May2nd, 1917.
Do you remember how in Aprillast year I called you up on the
telephone at 10 in the morningto come at once to the botanical
gardens and listen to thenightingale, which was giving a
regular concert there?
We hid ourselves in a thickshrubbery and sat on the stones
(05:11):
beside a trickling streamlet.
When the nightingale had ceasedsinging, there suddenly came a
plaintive, monotonous cry thatsounded something like glick
glick glick glick.
I said I thought it must be somekind of marsh bird, and Carl
agreed, but we never learnedexactly which bird it was.
Just fancy.
I heard the same call suddenlyhere from somewhere close at
(05:33):
hand a few days ago in the earlymorning.
And I burned with impatience tofind out what the bird was.
I could not rest until I'd doneso.
But it is not a marsh bird,after all.
It is a rhineck, a grey birdlarger than a sparrow.
It gets its name because of theway in which, when danger
threatens, it tries tointimidate its enemies by quaint
(05:54):
gestures and writhings of theneck.
It lives only on ants,collecting them with its sticky
tongue, just like an anteater.
The Spaniards call itHormiguero, the ant bird.
Mordeque has written someamusing verses on the rhineck,
and Ugo Wolf has set them tomusic.
Now that I found out what birdit is that gave the plaintiff
(06:15):
cry, I'm so pleased as ifsomeone had given me a present.
You might write to Carl aboutit.
He will like to know.
You ask what I am reading.
Natural science for the mostpart.
I am studying the distributionof plants and animals.
Yesterday I was reading aboutthe reasons for the
disappearance of songbirds inGermany.
The spread of scientificforestry, horticulture, and
(06:37):
agriculture have cut them offfrom their nesting places and
their food supply.
More and more, with modernmethods, we're doing away with
hollow trees, wastelands,brushwood, fallen leaves.
I feel sore at heart.
I was not thinking so much aboutthe loss of pleasure for human
beings, but I was so muchdistressed at the idea of the
stealthy and inexorabledestruction of these defenseless
(07:00):
little creatures that the tearscame into my eyes.
I suppose I must be out of sortsto feel everything so deeply.
Sometimes, however, it seems tome that I am not really a human
being at all, but like a bird ora beast in human form.
I feel so much more at home,even in the scrap of garden like
the one here, and still more inthe meadows when the grass is
(07:23):
humming with bees than at one ofour party congresses.
I can say that to you, for youwill not promptly suspect me of
treason to socialism.
You know I really hope to die atmy post in a street fighter in
prison.
But my innermost personalitybelongs more to my tomtits than
to the comrades.
Bertolt Bracht, morning addressto a tree named Green, 1927.
(07:47):
Green, I owe you an apology.
I couldn't sleep last nightbecause of the noise of the
storm.
When I looked out, I noticed youswaying like a drunken ape.
I remarked on it.
Today this yellow sun is shiningin your bare branches.
You're shaking off a few tearsstill, Green, but now you know
your own worth.
(08:08):
You have fought the bitterestfight of your life.
Vultures were taking an interestin you.
And now I know it's only by yourinexorable flexibility that you
were still upright this morning.
In view of your success, it's myopinion today.
It was no mean feat to grow upso tall in between the
(08:28):
tenements, so tall, green, thatthe storm can get at you as it
did last night.
Langston Hughes, Earth Song,1925.
It's an earth song.
And I've been waiting long foran earth song.
It's a spring song.
And I've been waiting long for aspring song.
(08:51):
Strong as the shoots of a newplant.
Strong as the bursting of newbuds.
Strong as the coming of thefirst child from its mother's
womb.
It's an earth song.
A body song.
A spring song.
I have been waiting long forthis spring song.
(09:16):
Today, Easter Sunday morning, asudden snowstorm swept over the
island.
Between the greening hedges laysnow.
My young son drew me to thelittle apricot tree by the house
wall, away from a verse in whichI pointed the finger at those
who were preparing a war whichcould well wipe out the
(09:39):
continent, this island, mypeople, my family, and myself.
In silence, we put a stack overthe freezing tree.
And I should note that the waythat this looks on a page is
like a tree.
Ada Lamon instructions on notgiving up.
(10:02):
2018.
More than the fuchsia funnelsbreaking out of the crab apple
tree, more than the neighbor'salmost obscene display of cherry
limbs shoving their cottoncandy-colored blossoms to the
slate sky of spring rains.
It's the greening of the treesthat really gets to me.
When all the shock of white andtaffy, the world's baubles and
(10:25):
trinkets, leave the pavementstrewn with the confetti of
aftermath, the leaves come.
Patient, plodding, a green skingrowing over whatever winter did
to us.
A return to the strange idea ofcontinuous living despite the
mess of us, the hurt, the empty.
(10:47):
Fine then.
I'll take it, the tree seems tosay.
A new slick leaf unfurling likea fist to an open palm.
I'll take it all.
Thanks as always to ourproduction crew, Emma, Michael,
and Tim, who put this alltogether.
Class is a podcast of DSA'sNational Political Education
(11:09):
Committee, or NPEC, which worksto expand the knowledge of DSA
members and non-members in theservice of winning the struggle
for socialism and democracy.
You can find out more about NPECby searching for us online or
following us on social media,but the best way to find out
what our committee's up to is bysigning up for Red Letter,
NPEC's monthly newsletter.
And if you aren't already, youcan become a DSA member by
(11:31):
following the link in thepodcast description.
Okay, until next time,Solidarity.
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