Free Verse

"Let America Be America Again"

By: Langston Hughes

(poem from poets.org)

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark? 
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home—
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free?  Not me?
Surely not me?  The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay—
Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—
The land that never has been yet—
And yet must be—the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine—the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME—
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath—
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain—
All, all the stretch of these great green states—
And make America again!

Biographical Information

        James Langston Hughes was born February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri. His parents divorced   when he was a young child, and his father moved to Mexico. He was raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen, when he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to live with his mother and her husband, before   the family eventually settled in Cleveland, Ohio. It was in Lincoln that Hughes began writing    poetry. After graduating from high school, he spent a year in Mexico followed by a year at Columbia University in New York City.  He finished his college education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania three years later. In 1930 his first novel, Not Without             Laughter, (Knopf, 1930) won the Harmon gold medal for literature. 

         Hughes, who claimed Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg, and Walt Whitman as his primaryinfluences, is particularly          known for his insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from   the twenties through the sixties. He wrote novels, short     stories and plays, as well as poetry, known for his engagement with the world of jazz and the influence it had on his writing, as in his book-length poem Montage of a Dream Deferred (Holt, 1951). His life and work were enormously important in shaping the artistic   contributions of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. Unlike other  notable black poets of the period—Claude McKay, Jean Toomer,and Countee Cullen—He refused to differentiate between his personal experience and the common experience of black America. He wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of          music, laughter, and language itself. 

(biographical information from poets.org)

Explanation of Technique

         Free verse is a type of poem that is free of constraints contained in other types of poem. For instance, for free verse poems         there is no certain format needed for them. Also, free verse poems usually do not have to rhyme. Therefore, they follow the natural     rhythms of speech. The poem, "Let America Be America Again", by Langston Hughes, is a free verse poem because it follow no       poetic pattern or format.

Interpretation of Poem

        This powerful poem by Langston Hughes talks about the hypocrisy that used to be all over America, especially in the South. In  the poem, Langston Hughes talks about how unfairly African Americans were treated. That is why he talks about Liberty wearing a   false patriotic wreath. Later in  the poem, Langston Hughes describes wanting America to be America again. That includes America being the land of the free and equality being everywhere. 

(picture from breakingchainsministries.com)

Explanation of Visual

        The picture above is of a chain breaking. This is to represent America breaking free of the things holding it back from becoming a great nation. The things holding America back are described in the poem, like segregation, racism, and discrimination.