Let America Be America Again By Langston Hughes
Dear DU friends,
This poem speaks to my heart in a way few others can.
Hughes' final stanza lays out the mission and the work that lies ahead for President-Elect Joe Biden, Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris and those of us who love America and want it to become "the dream the dreamers dreamed."
The entire poem can be found at the link, and it is well worth reading.
love,
Wicked Blue
Let America Be America Again
By Langston Hughes
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.
***
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!
Langston Hughes, "Let America be America Again" from The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes. Copyright © 1995 by Langston Hughes.
Link to the full poem
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/147907/let-america-be-america-again