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I went down to the river, I set down on the bank. I tried to think but couldn’t, So I jumped in and sank.

Langston Hughes

Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Head Kiss Rain Sing Yourself
If you want to honor me, give some young boy or girl who’s coming along trying to create arts and write and compose and sing and act and paint and dance and make something out of the beauties of the Negro race-give that child some help.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Beautiful Children Help Honor Man Race Respect Woman Writing Young
Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Bird Break Death Deep Dreams Fast Fly Hold Life Wings
I did not believe political directives could be successfully applied to creative writing . . . not to poetry or fiction, which to be valid had to express as truthfully as possible the individual emotions and reactions of the writer.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Believe Creative Direction Politics Reaction Success Thinking Writing
Both of them were very good and kind – the one who went to church and the one who didn’t. And no doubt from them I learned to like both Christians and sinners equally well.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Doubt Equality Goodness Kindness Learning Myself Sin
If the government can set aside some spot for a elk to be a elk without being bothered, or a buffalo to be a buffalo without being shot down, there ought to be some place where a Negro can be a Negro without being Jim Crowed.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Animal Be Yourself Equality Government Oppression Place Safety
Politics in any country in the world is dangerous. For the poet, politics in any country had better be disguised as poetry. Politics can be the graveyard of the poet. And only poetry can be his resurrection.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Country Dangerous Grave Himself Poet Poetry Politics World
Peace We passed their graves: The dead men there, Winners or losers, Did not care. In the dark They could not see Who had gained The victory.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Death Grave Man Peace Victory
That Justice is a blind goddess Is a thing to which we black are wise: Her bandage hides two festering sores That once perhaps were eyes.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Black Eyes Hide Justice
I went down to the river, I set down on the bank. I tried to think but couldn’t, So I jumped in and sank.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Jump Myself River Thinking
Words Like Freedom There are words like Freedom Sweet and wonderful to say. On my heartstrings freedom sings All day everyday. There are words like Liberty That almost make me cry. If you had known what I know You would know why.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Freedom Heart Myself Sing Wonderful Word
What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or does it explode?
LANGSTON HUGHES

Dreams Explode Sun
Life is for the living. Death is for the dead. Let life be like music. And death a note unsaid.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Death Life Live Music Note
I look at my own body With eyes no longer blind- And I see that my own hands can make The world that’s in my mind.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Blind Body Eyes Hands Inspirational Mindset Motivational Power See World
For poems are like rainbows; they escape you quickly.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Escape Poem Quick Yourself
I am the American heartbreak- The rock on which Freedom Stumped its toe.
LANGSTON HUGHES

Freedom Heart Broken Myself

I went down to the river, I set down on the bank. I tried to think but couldn’t, So I jumped in and sank.

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I went down to the river, I set down on the bank. I tried to think but couldn’t, So I jumped in and sank.

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Popular Authors

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