The vocal “Strange Fruit” was foremost exposed as a verse form written by Abel Meeropol who may be better recognized under his assumed name. Lewis Allan. “Strange Fruit” was finalized in the late thirtiess. the same clip that African- Americans in the South were being lynched by white supremacist groups in the yearss of America’s post- Abolition motion. Throughout the motion. the emphasis on seeing no evil and hearing no immorality at this clip was strongly enforced. Yet. Meeropol opened the eyes of his audience to the ugly truth about the horrors that African- Americans experienced through the Abolition. For Billy Holiday. one of tonss of creative persons to execute “Strange Fruit” . this vocal has a deeper significance than what the surface offers.

As an Afro-american. she suffered adversities through the Abolition that many could non conceive of. Due to the intervention of inkinesss and Jim Crow Torahs. Holiday’s pa was denied medical entryway into a chiefly white infirmary. fell ill. and subsequently died of internal hemorrhage. She was portion of the Abolition and the Abolition was portion of her. This can be verified every bit shortly as she sings the first words of “Strange Fruit” . The tone of her voice supports her personal connexion that she portions with the vocal and its overall significance of the intervention of African-Americans during the Abolition.

“Strange Fruit” is formed by three short poetries that all use dry and unostentatious linguistic communication that forces the reader to delve deeper into history and detect what this “Strange Fruit” truly is. This verse form follows a lyric form. showing deep ideas and emotions about the lynching in the South. An elegiac form can besides be extracted from this verse form due to its memorialization to those unusual fruit that died as a direct consequence of lynching. A rhyme strategy of A. A. B. B. C. C. D. D. E. E. F. F is followed leting the steady repeat of sounds to make a derisive round. The tune is slow and conveys a melancholy feeling that Holiday sings so strongly to a point where it seems as if she may shout. There is an absence in her eyes. an emptiness that places Holiday in her ain small universe. leting her to convey hurting and hatred but at the same clip sorrow and choler.

The apposition of a beautiful landscape with the scene of lynching. the odor of magnolias with that of firing flesh. the flowers more typically associated with the Southern clime with the “strange fruit” . symbolically introduces

the five senses to be analyzed. The wordss convey a gruesome and disgusting atmosphere — where we feel the rain gather and the air current suction. we see the horror of black organic structures hanging from trees and their blood covering foliages. we smell the burned flesh of the icky cadavers and the magnolias and the organic structures decomposing in the Sun. we taste the resentment of all the lives and unusual fruit that the lynching have claimed. and we hear the crows tweaking at the dead bodies’ pouching eyes. This imagination conjures the stalking power that domination holds and the decease defying harm it can make.

Southern trees bear a unusual fruit.
Blood on the foliages and blood at the root.
Black organic structure singing in the Southern zephyr.
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
Pastoral scene of the gallant South.
The convex eyes and the distorted oral cavity.
Aroma of magnolia sweet and fresh.
And the sudden odor of firing flesh!

Here is a fruit for the crows to tweak.
For the rain to garner. for the air current to suck.
For the Sun to decompose. for a tree to bead.
Here is a unusual and acrimonious harvest.