I’ve been considering this post for a long time. The purpose of this blog is to showcase my passion for poetry, in tandem with my podcast (The Poetry Podcast) and my business of hosting poetry parties and poetry workshops. Initially, I intended this post to be strictly about poetry. However, nothing exists in a vacuum, and for me, the personal is political.
For the past week, I have been seeing my rights revoked with the stroke of a pen that belongs to a person to whom I and my experiences are completely alien. The onslaught of Executive Orders is overwhelming and the cause of much despair for me and my loved ones.
It’s at times like these that I lean into poetry. Thus, I’ve decided to discuss two poems (“Let America be America Again” by Langston Hughes and “‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers” by Emily Dickinson) and the idea of hope within the current political landscape of the United States.
Langston Hughes writes, “(America was never America to me.)” repeatedly throughout his poem:
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!
At first glance, this poem speaks to the idea of the American dream while pointing out that the dream excludes so many—the poor, immigrants, people of color. It’s true that so much progress (before the events of the past week) had been made to improve the lives of these populations since the time when Hughes was writing—and yet, there is so much more that needs to be done (even more so now that Trump has started signing Executive Orders). Therefore, it Is so easy to dwell in the first two thirds of the poem. I know that for me, the “brainbots” in my mind (picture a million little minions) are running in all directions, screaming into the great, cavernous abyss of our future. I am disheartened, and I am furious.
However, we need to remember that Hughes’ poem is dynamic, and it shifts to hope! Can you feel the expression and feeling in those lines, “O, let America be America again—/The land that never has been yet—/And yet must be—the land where every man is free”? And again in that penultimate stanza: “America never was America to me,/And yet I swear this oath–/America will be!”? The tone is sweeping, building, mounting, to that last line, “And make America again!” If we built America once, we can do it again, and we can really make it live up to the dream! There it is—hope!
And when I think about hope, I think about Emily Dickinson’s famous poem:
“Hope” is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –
And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard –
And sore must be the storm –
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm –
I’ve heard it in the chillest land –
And on the strangest Sea –
Yet – never – in Extremity,
It asked a crumb – of me.
What strikes me today is the second stanza, lines 6-8: “And sore must be the storm -/That could abash the little Bird/That kept so many warm -.” Well, Emily (if I may call you Emily?), we’re experiencing that storm right now, and it sure is a doozy! With Executive Orders reversing the progress Americans have made since at least the 1960s, this is guaranteed to be a long storm, too. And yet, Emily, you’ve “heard it in the chilliest land -/And on the strangest Sea -.” The thing about hope is that it is nothing but pervasive and persevering.
So, what else should we remember or think about regarding hope, today and over the next four years? With the new administration and the ever-growing list of Executive Orders, what do we hope for? What should we hope for?
Let’s remember that it costs nothing to hope, that hope can lead to positive change, that hope persists. Let’s hope for a bright way out of this darkness, and let’s hope in ourselves and our chosen families. Let’s all lean into poetry a bit more. Shameless plug: One way to bring more poetry into your life is to listen to The Poetry Podcast! Another is to find hope and joy (and poetry) in unusual places—like one of my poetry parties! Book a consultation with me!
I have the hope that we will outlast this, that we will “build America again,” and that our “little Bird[s]” will weather this storm. We are resilient.
Works Cited
Dickinson, Emily. “‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers.” The Poetry Foundation,
www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/42889/hope-is-the-thing-with-feathers-314.
Hughes, Langston. “Let America be America Again.” The Poetry Foundation,
www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/147907/let-america-be-america-again.