Let me make the songs for the people,
Songs for the old and young;
Songs to stir like a battle cry
Wherever they are sung.

Let me sing for little children,
Before their footsteps stray,
Sweet anthems of love and duty,
To float o'er  life's highway.

I would sing for the poor and aged,
When shadows dim their sight;
Of the bright and restful mansions,
Where there shall be no night.

Our world, so worn and weary,
Needs music, pure, and strong,
To hush the jangle and discords
Of sorrow, pain, and wrong

− Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825 − 1911) was committed to the struggle for women's rights and published novels, short stories, and poetry that focused on issues of racism and social reform, in 1858, a hundred years before the Rosa Parks incident, Fraances Watkins also had refused to give up her seat in the white section of a trolley car in Philadelphia.

1. battle cry: words or sounds used by soldiers before a battle to encourage, motivate each other 
2. stray: wander, get lost
3. jangle and discords: here, noisy disputes, arguments