This is a VERY late post to this thread but I stumbled across "Poor lil' brack sheep in "The Best Loved Poems of the American People" P.313, attributed to Ethyl M. C. Brazelton. (Her maiden name I found out elsewhere was Colson). Later I found in "The World's Best Loved Poems," P.144, the same poem, (minus the 2nd & 3rd stanzas), attributed to Paul Laurence Dunbar, considered the first great American black poet. Now I've learned the poem was written by Colson/Brazelton AND Lucy Rider Meyer but I learn elsewhere that Meyer wrote 6 poems and none of them are named "Poor lil' brack sheep." I really like the poem, especially the longer version, but I'm going nuts figuring out if anybody wrote it.