Lyrics of Lowly Life 1896 is a collection of poems by African American author Paul Laurence Dunbar. Published while Dunbar was at a turning point in his career as one of the nations leading black poets Lyrics of Lowly Life combined his hugely successful volumes Oak and Ivy 1892 and Majors and Minors 1896 establishing his reputation as an artist with a powerful vision of faith and perseverance who sought to capture and examine the diversity of the African American experience. In ampampquotThe Poet and His Songampampquot Dunbar compares the art of poetry to tilling the soil a slow and painstaking process requiring full commitment body and soul to the task at hand ampampquotMy days are never days of ease I till my ground and prune my trees.