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Brotherly Love. A Little Letter to the White Citizens of the South In line of what my folks say in Montgomery, In line of what they’re teaching about love, When I reach out my hand, will you take it Or cut it off and leave a nub above?
Feb 7, 2024 · Brotherly Love. 0. 0. [Dr. King and Langston Hughes maintained a friendship for years. Hughes wrote this poem in 1956 during the 13-month Montgomery bus boycott. Day after day, Negroes walked miles to work instead of riding the buses, and Dr. King first emerged as a leading force in the civil rights movement.]
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- “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”
- “Mother to Son”
- “Dreams”
- “The Weary Blues”
- “Po’ Boy Blues”
- “Let America Be America Again”
- “Life Is Fine”
- “I, Too”
- “Harlem”
- “Brotherly Love”
Written when he was 17 years old on a train to Mexico City to see his father, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” was Hughes’ first published poem. It appeared in the June 1921 issue of the NAACP magazine The Crisis and received critical acclaim. The opening lines show a soul deeper than his age: “I’ve known rivers / I’ve known rivers ancient as the world...
With recitations from notable figures such as Martin Luther King Jr. and actor Viola Davis, “Mother to Son” was published in the December 1922 issue of The Crisis. The 20-line poem traces a mother’s words to her child about their difficult life journey using the analogy of stairs with “tacks” and “splinters” in it. But ultimately she encourages her...
One of several Hughes poems about dreams and fittingly titled, this 1922 poem appeared in World Tomorrow. “Dreams,” an eight-line poem, remains a popular inspirational quote. It partially reads: “Hold fast to dreams / For if dreams die / Life is a broken-winged bird / That cannot fly.” Full Text
“The Weary Blues” follows an African American pianist playing in Harlem on Lenox Avenue. It starts off sounding like he’s completely carefree but ends: “The stars went out and so did the moon / The singer stopped playing and went to bed / While the Weary Blues echoed through his head / He slept like a rock or a man that’s dead.” After it won a cont...
As one of four Hughes poems that appeared in the November 1926 issue of Poetry Magazine, as well as his collection The Weary Blues, this poem feels music-like with its stanza and rhymes. The final verse reads: “Weary, weary / Weary early in de morn. / Weary, weary / Early, early in de morn. / I’s so wear / I wish I’d never been born.” Full Text
First published in the July 1936 issue of Esquire magazine, “Let America Be America Again” highlights how class plays such a crucial role in the ability to realize the promises of the American dream. The three opening stanzas are each followed by a parenthetical representing the cast-off realities for the lower class, such as: “Let America be Ameri...
Perseverance pushes through all the odds—even suicide attempts—in “Life is Fine.” Broken into three sections, the first part talks about jumping into a cold river: “If that water hadn’t a-been so cold / I might’ve sunk and died.” And the second about going to the top of a 16-floor building: “If it hadn’t a-been so high/ I might’ve jumped and died.”...
In “I, Too,” Hughes addresses segregation head-on: “I am the darker brother / They send me to eat in the kitchen / When company comes.” Despite being hidden in the back, he continues to “laugh,” “eat well,” and “grow strong.” The subject looks to a future of equality, emphatically declaring “I, too, am America.” Full Text
Perhaps his most influential poem, “Harlem” starts with the line “What happens to a dream deferred? / Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?” The poem digs into the dichotomy of the idea of the American dream juxtaposed with the reality of being in a marginalized community. Hughes’ words inspired the title of Lorraine Hansberry’s 1959 play A Rais...
Despite the fact that Hughes was more of a household name than King at the time, the poet wrote “Brotherly Love” about the civil rights activist and the Montgomery bus boycott, which starts: “In line of what my folks say in Montgomery / In line of what they’re teaching about love / When I reach out my hand, will you take it — / Or cut it off and le...
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- Deputy Editor
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Langston Hughes was a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance, the flowering of black intellectual, literary, and artistic life that took place in the 1920s in a number of American cities, particularly Harlem. A major poet, Hughes also wrote novels, short stories, essays, and plays.
Apr 3, 2018 · That same year, Hughes wrote a poem about Dr. King and the bus boycott titled “ Brotherly Love .” At the time, Hughes was much more famous than King, who was honored to have become a...
Jun 22, 2022 · 11. Brotherly Love. Hughes wrote Brotherly Love during the bus boycott in 1956. The poem is about Hughes’ friend, Martin Luther King Jr., and the Montgomery bus boycott. The poem focuses on the discrimination of blacks by white race in Montgomery. In Brotherly Love, the speaker tells the reader what his people say in Montgomery about the ...
