Let America Be America Again

• Author: Barry E. Hill
• Pages: 3-3

Let America Be America Again

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

at 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 f ree,

Equality is in the air we breathe.

(ere’s never been equality for me,

Nor freedom in this “ homeland of the free.”)

****

We, the people, must redeem

e land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.

e mountains and the endless plain –

All, all the stretch of these great green states–

And make America again!1

—Langston Hughes

African American poet and author

1. T C P  L H 189 (Arnold Rampersad & David Roessel eds., Vintage Books 1994).