“Let America be America again. Let it be the dream it used to be.”

— Langston Hughes, "Let America Be America Again", 1935

About Langston Hughes

1901 – 1967

American poet and writer of the Harlem Renaissance, known for poems such as 'The Negro Speaks of Rivers' and 'Harlem'.

“Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.”

“For poems are like rainbows; they escape you quickly.”

“There are lots of different kinds of blood in our family.”

“You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.”

“Myths are made for the imagination to breathe life into them.”

“It is in vain to dream of a wildness distant from ourselves.”

“Tell me not, in mournful numbers, life is but an empty dream!”

“I had a dream, which was not all a dream.”

“The fact is the sweetest dream that labor knows.”