"Let America Be America Again" by Langston Hughes
b'Listen to more GoodPoetry at www.GoodPoetry.org, and connect with @itsGoodPoetry on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram\\n______________________________________\\n"Let America Be America Again" by Langston Hughes\\n\\nLet America be America again.\\nLet it be the dream it used to be.\\nLet it be the pioneer on the plain\\nSeeking a home where he himself is free.\\n\\n(America never was America to me.)\\n\\nLet America be the dream the dreamers dreamed\\u2014\\nLet it be that great strong land of love\\nWhere never kings connive nor tyrants scheme\\nThat any man be crushed by one above.\\n\\n(It never was America to me.)\\n\\nO, let my land be a land where Liberty\\nIs crowned with no false patriotic wreath,\\nBut opportunity is real, and life is free,\\nEquality is in the air we breathe.\\n\\n(There\\u2019s never been equality for me,\\nNor freedom in this \\u201chomeland of the free.\\u201d)\\n\\nSay, who are you that mumbles in the dark? \\nAnd who are you that draws your veil across the stars?\\n\\nI am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,\\nI am the Negro bearing slavery\\u2019s scars.\\nI am the red man driven from the land,\\nI am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek\\u2014\\nAnd finding only the same old stupid plan\\nOf dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.\\n\\nI am the young man, full of strength and hope,\\nTangled in that ancient endless chain\\nOf profit, power, gain, of grab the land!\\nOf grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!\\nOf work the men! Of take the pay!\\nOf owning everything for one\\u2019s own greed!\\n\\nI am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.\\nI am the worker sold to the machine.\\nI am the Negro, servant to you all.\\nI am the people, humble, hungry, mean\\u2014\\nHungry yet today despite the dream.\\nBeaten yet today\\u2014O, Pioneers!\\nI am the man who never got ahead,\\nThe poorest worker bartered through the years.\\n\\nYet I\\u2019m the one who dreamt our basic dream\\nIn the Old World while still a serf of kings,\\nWho dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,\\nThat even yet its mighty daring sings\\nIn every brick and stone, in every furrow turned\\nThat\\u2019s made America the land it has become.\\nO, I\\u2019m the man who sailed those early seas\\nIn search of what I meant to be my home\\u2014\\nFor I\\u2019m the one who left dark Ireland\\u2019s shore,\\nAnd Poland\\u2019s plain, and England\\u2019s grassy lea,\\nAnd torn from Black Africa\\u2019s strand I came\\nTo build a \\u201chomeland of the free.\\u201d\\n\\nThe free?\\n\\nWho said the free? Not me?\\nSurely not me? The millions on relief today?\\nThe millions shot down when we strike?\\nThe millions who have nothing for our pay?\\nFor all the dreams we\\u2019ve dreamed\\nAnd all the songs we\\u2019ve sung\\nAnd all the hopes we\\u2019ve held\\nAnd all the flags we\\u2019ve hung,\\nThe millions who have nothing for our pay\\u2014\\nExcept the dream that\\u2019s almost dead today.\\n\\nO, let America be America again\\u2014\\nThe land that never has been yet\\u2014\\nAnd yet must be\\u2014the land where every man is free.\\nThe land that\\u2019s mine\\u2014the poor man\\u2019s, Indian\\u2019s, Negro\\u2019s, ME\\u2014\\nWho made America,\\nWhose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,\\nWhose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,\\nMust bring back our mighty dream again.\\n\\nSure, call me any ugly name you choose\\u2014\\nThe steel of freedom does not stain.\\nFrom those who live like leeches on the people\\u2019s lives,\\nWe must take back our land again,\\nAmerica!\\n\\nO, yes,\\nI say it plain,\\nAmerica never was America to me,\\nAnd yet I swear this oath\\u2014\\nAmerica will be!\\n\\nOut of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,\\nThe rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,\\nWe, the people, must redeem\\nThe land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.\\nThe mountains and the endless plain\\u2014\\nAll, all the stretch of these great green states\\u2014\\nAnd make America again!\\nFrom The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Copyright \\xa9 1994 the Estate of Langston Hughes.'