Quotes from Langston Hughes

O, let my land be a land where Liberty Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath, But opportunity is real, & 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.")

Joe has sense enough to know He is a god. So many gods don't know.

People up today and down tomorrow, working this week and fired the next, beaten and baffled, but determined not to be wholly beaten, buying furniture on the installment plan, filling the house with roomers to help pay the rent, hoping to get a new suit for Easter—and pawning that suit before the Fourth of July.

Way Down South in Dixie (Break the heart of me) They hung my black young lover To a cross roads tree. Way Down South in Dixie (Bruised body high in air) I asked the white Lord Jesus What was the use of prayer. Way Down South in Dixie (Break the heart of me) Love is a naked shadow On a gnarled and naked tree.

The boss's got all he needs, certainly, Eats swell, Owns a lotta houses, Goes vacationin', Breaks strikes, Runs politics, bribes police, Pays off congress, And struts all over the earth-- But me, I ain't never had enough to eat. Me, I ain't never been warm in winter. Me, I ain't never known security-- All my life, been livin' hand to mouth, Hand to mouth.

Cora was like a tree—once rooted, she stood, in spite of storms and strife, wind, and rocks, in the earth.

There stands the white man, Boss of the fields-- Lord of the land And all that it yields. Here bend the black folks, Hands to the soil-- Bosses of nothing. Not even their toil.

Maybe you'll be better treated next time." "Not as long as I am black," said Simple. "You look at everything, I regret to say, in terms of black and white." "So does the Law," said Simple.

I'm looking for a house In the world Where white shadows Will not fall. There is no such house, Dark brother, No such house At all.

Now I do not understand Why God don't protect a man From police brutality. Being poor and black, I've no weapon to strike back-- So who but the Lord Can protect me?

I tire so of hearing people say, Let things take their course. Tomorrow is another day. I do not need my freedom whem I'm dead.

They will let you have dope Because they are quite willing To drug you or kill you. They will let you have babies Because they are quite willing To pauperize you-- Or use your kids as labor boys For army, air force, or uranium mine. They will let you have alcohol To make you sodden and drunk And foolish. They will gleefully let you Kill your damn self any way you choose With liquor, drugs, or whatever.

Consider me, Descended also From the Mystery.

The silence inside the library, the big chairs, and long tables, and the fact that the library was always there and didn't seem to have a mortgage on it, or any sort of insecurity about it—all of that made me love it.

Have luncheon there this afternoon, all you jobless. Why not? Dine with some of the men and women who got rich off of your labor, who clip coupons with clean white fingers because your hands dug coal, drilled stone, sewed garments, poured steel to let other people draw dividends and live easy.

A Christian Country God slumbers in a back alley With a gin bottle in His hand. Come on, God, get up and fight Like a man.

Why did white folks think you could live on nothing but art? Strange! Too strange! Too strange!

And expose war. And the old My-Country-'Tis-of' Thee lie. And the colored American Legion posts strutting around talking about the privilege of dying for the noble Red, White, and Blue, when they aren't even permitted the privilege of living for it. Or voting for it in Texas. Or working for it in the diplomatic service. Or even rising, like every other good little boy, from the log cabin to the White House. White House is right.

All the problems known to the Jews today in Hitler's Germany, we who are Negroes know here in America--with one difference. Here we may speak openly about our problems, write about them, protest, and seek to better our conditions. In Germany the Jews may do none of these things. Democracy permits us the freedom of a hope, and some action towards the realization of that hope.

We buried him high on a windy hill, But his soul went out to sea. I know, for I heard, when all was still, His sea-soul say to me: Put no tombstone at my head, For here I do not make my bed. Strew no flowers on my grave, I've gone back to the wind and wave. Do not, do not weep for me, For I am happy with my sea.

I'm like that old mule- Black- and don't give a damn! You got to take me Like I am.

All of us know that the gay and sparkling life of the so-called Negro Renaissance of the '20's was not so gay and sparkling beneath the surface as it looked.

What a difference a border makes: on one side of an invisible line, food; on the other side, none. On one side, peace. On the other side, war. On one side, quiet in the sunlight. On the other side the dangerous chee-eep, chee-eep, chee-eep, that was not birds, the BANG! of shells, the whine of sirens, and the bursting of bombs over crowded cities.

What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?