Langston Hughes: "The Negro Mother"

Biography:
One of the nation's first African American poets is known as James Langston Hughes. Though he was born in Jolplin Missouri, he grew up attending Central High School in Cleveland Ohio where he began writing. His interest in poetry followed him all the way through his college years. Though his father discouraged his literary interests, and even bribed him to pursue an engineering degree at Columbia University, Hughes nevertheless continued to write poetry despite his father's wishes.
True to his African American heritage, the themes of his works encompass the persecution as well as the trials associated with slavery and racism. Both of these topics of which were still being disputed over during the Civil Rights Movement. 

 (1902-1967)

Resources:
http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/langston_hughes/biography
http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/langston_hughes/poems/16951

The poem I read for today is titled "The Negro Mother". In this work, Hughes communicates the hardships and desires of a slave from the perspective of an African American woman. The speaker of the poem is the Negro Mother and she is telling a story to her audience; the children or the future generation of her race. I see the desire in this woman to endure hardship for the sake of her children. Her hope is that some day her children shall be free. Therefore, she wants to be remembered for the work for the sake of others.

The Negro Mother by Langston Hughes

Children, I come back today
To tell you a story of the long dark way
That I had to climb, that I had to know
In order that the race might live and grow.
Look at my face -- dark as the night --
Yet shining like the sun with love's true light.
I am the dark girl who crossed the red sea
Carrying in my body the seed of the free.
I am the woman who worked in the field
Bringing the cotton and the corn to yield.
I am the one who labored as a slave,
Beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave --
Children sold away from me, I'm husband sold, too.
No safety , no love, no respect was I due.

Three hundred years in the deepest South:
But God put a song and a prayer in my mouth .
God put a dream like steel in my soul.
Now, through my children, I'm reaching the goal.

Now, through my children, young and free,
I realized the blessing deed to me.
I couldn't read then. I couldn't write.
I had nothing, back there in the night.
Sometimes, the valley was filled with tears,
But I kept trudging on through the lonely years.
Sometimes, the road was hot with the sun,
But I had to keep on till my work was done:
I had to keep on! No stopping for me --
I was the seed of the coming Free.
I nourished the dream that nothing could smother
Deep in my breast -- the Negro mother.
I had only hope then , but now through you,
Dark ones of today, my dreams must come true:
All you dark children in the world out there,
Remember my sweat, my pain, my despair.
Remember my years, heavy with sorrow --
And make of those years a torch for tomorrow.
Make of my pass a road to the light
Out of the darkness, the ignorance, the night.
Lift high my banner out of the dust.
Stand like free men supporting my trust.
Believe in the right, let none push you back.
Remember the whip and the slaver's track.
Remember how the strong in struggle and strife
Still bar you the way, and deny you life --
But march ever forward, breaking down bars.
Look ever upward at the sun and the stars.
Oh, my dark children, may my dreams and my prayers
Impel you forever up the great stairs --
For I will be with you till no white brother
Dares keep down the children of the Negro Mother.