I, Too
As I Grew Older
Langston Hughes
Langston Hughes
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.
Besides,
They'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed-I, too, am America.
It was a long time ago.
I have almost forgotten my dream.
But it was there then,
In front of me,
Bright like a sun-My dream.
And then the wall rose,
Rose slowly,
Slowly,
Between me and my dream.
Rose until it touched the sky-The wall.
Shadow.
I am black.
I lie down in the shadow.
No longer the light of my dream before me,
Above me.
Only the thick wall.
Only the shadow.
My hands!
My dark hands!
Break through the wall!
Find my dream!
Help me to shatter this darkness,
To smash this night,
To break this shadow
Into a thousand lights of sun,
Into a thousand whirling dreams
Of sun!
A Black Man Talks of Reaping
Any Human to Another
Arna Bontemps
by Countee Cullen
I have sown beside all waters in my day.
I planted deep, within my heart the fear
that wind or fowl would take the grain away.
I planted safe against this stark, lean year.
I scattered seed enough to plant the land
in rows from Canada to Mexico
but for my reaping only what the hand
can hold at once is all that I can show.
The ills I sorrow at
Not me alone
Like an arrow,
Pierce to the marrow,
Through the fat
And past the bone.
Yet what I sowed and what the orchard yields
my brother's sons are gathering stalk and root;
small wonder then my children glean in fields
they have not sown, and feed on bitter fruit.
Your grief and mine
Must intertwine
Like sea and river,
Be fused and mingle,
Diverse yet single,
Forever and forever.
Saturday’s Child
Let no man be so proud
And confident,
To think he is allowed
A little tent
Pitched in a meadow
Of sun and shadow
All his little own.
Countee Cullen
Some are teethed on a silver spoon,
With the stars strung for a rattle;
I cut my teeth as the black racoon—
For implements of battle.
Some are swaddled in silk and down,
And heralded by a star;
They swathed my limbs in a sackcloth gown
On a night that was black as tar.
For some, godfather and goddame
The opulent fairies be;
Dame Poverty gave me my name,
And Pain godfathered me.
For I was born on Saturday—
"Bad time for planting a seed,"
Was all my father had to say,
And, "One mouth more to feed."
Death cut the strings that gave me life,
And handed me to Sorrow,
The only kind of middle wife
My folks could beg or borrow.
Joy may be shy, unique,
Friendly to a few,
Sorrow never scorned to speak
To any who
Were false or true.
Your very grief
Like a blade
Shining and unsheathed
Must strike me down.
Of bitter aloes wreathed,
My sorrow must be laid
On your head like a crown.
I, Too
By Langston Hughes
1. Who is the speaker in the poem?
2. What does the kitchen symbolize?
3. What is a possible theme for this poem? Provide textual evidence for your answer.
4. What is the tone of this poem?
5. What words or images create this tone?
6. Why will tomorrow be different?
7. Who will “see how beautiful [he is]”?
8. How does the speaker feel about himself? Provide textual evidence for your answer.
9. How does he feel about his race? Provide textual evidence for your answer.
As I Grew Older
By Langston Hughes
1. Find a simile and copy it here. What two things are being compared?
2. What does this comparison suggest?
3. The poem is titled, “As I Grew Older,” so we get a glimpse of how he felt as a child and how he
feels now as an adult. How did the speaker feel about life when he was a child?
4. What happened to his dreams?
5. Why?
6. What does the wall symbolize?
7. What does the shadow symbolize?
8. What could be a good theme for this poem?
9. What is the tone of the poem?
10. What are some words that create this tone?
11. What happens when he breaks down the wall?
12. What does this suggest is possible?
13. Summarize the poem in your own words.
14. Underline the most powerful lines and explain what significance they have.
A Black man Talks of Reaping
By Arna Bontemps
1. What is the work done by the speaker in the poem?
2. How would you explain the fears and concerns expressed in the first stanza?
3. Who are “my brother’s sons”?
4. What are they doing?
5. In your opinion, why are they able to act in such a way?
6. What does the speaker mean by “my children glean in fields they have not sown”?
7. What might be the bitter fruit the children feed on? Explain.
8. In this poem, Bontemps uses end rhyme. What ideas might Bontemps be trying to emphasize
through his use of rhyme?
9. In the poem, some people gain from the work of others. Is it fair to benefit from the labor of
others? Explain.
10. What is the tone of the poem?
11. What words or phrases create this tone?
12. Summarize the poem in your own words.
13. Underline the most powerful lines and explain what significance they have.
Saturday’s Child
By Countee Cullen
1. When Cullen writes, “Dam Poverty game me my name,/And Pain godfathered me,” what literary
element does he use?
2. What tone does this create?
3. What is he suggesting about life?
4. What two groups does Cullen compare?
5. Describe each group using textual evidence.
6. To what does his father compare his birth?
7. What does this comparison imply?
8. Again, Cullen uses an example of personification when he writes, “Death cut the strings that gave
me life.” What does this image suggest about the speaker’s life?
9. What is the message or theme of this poem? Explain providing textual evidence.
10. Summarize the poem in your own words.
11. Underline the most powerful lines and explain what significance they have.
Any Human to Another
1. A simile is a comparison that uses words such as like or as. What similes does the writer use in the
first and second stanzas?
2. What ideas do they support?
3. What visual image does the poet use in the third stanza?
4. What warning is implied here?
5. What qualities are contrasted in the two final stanza?
6. What images are attributed to each quality?
7. Why might Cullen have selected those particular images?
8. Whom does the speaker address?
9. Why does the speaker say that his grief musth be mixed with that of his audience?
10. In this poem, Cullen personifies, or gives human attributes to, the emotions of joy and sorrow.
What might be the purpose of his personification?
11. Do you agree with the argument that the speaker makes?
12. Why or why not?
13. To which individuals or groups might you address this poem today?
14. What is the tone of the poem?
15. What words/phrases create this tone?
16. Summarize the poem in your own words?
17. Underline the most powerful lines and explain what significance they have.