The poem I am reviewing is I, Too Am America by Langston Hughes. I remember the first time I was introduced to this poem. I was about twelve years old, in the sixth grade, at Davis Elementary School in Greenwood, Mississippi. We were asked to research, memorize, and perform a poem for the Black History Program. This was the piece I decided to perform.<\/p>\n
I, Too<\/em><\/p>\n By Langston Hughes<\/em><\/p>\n I, too, sing America.<\/em><\/p>\n I am the darker brother.<\/em><\/p>\n They send me to eat in the kitchen<\/em><\/p>\n When company comes,<\/em><\/p>\n But I laugh,<\/em><\/p>\n And eat well,<\/em><\/p>\n And grow strong.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Tomorrow,<\/em><\/p>\n I\u2019ll be at the table<\/em><\/p>\n When company comes.<\/em><\/p>\n Nobody\u2019ll dare<\/em><\/p>\n Say to me,<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cEat in the kitchen,\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Then.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Besides,<\/em><\/p>\n They\u2019ll see how beautiful I am<\/em><\/p>\n And be ashamed\u2014<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n I, too, am America.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n This poem resonates with me soul-y because of the content. I am a black male in the United States of America. It is pretty difficult living being a black male in this day and age. His first line, \u201cI too, sing America,\u201d reminds me of the Star Spangled Banner. (I am pretty sure this is not what he meant, but it is where my mind went.) There have been a lot of white people to sing the Start Spangled Banner, but there have been even more black people to sing it. In reality, the black people who sung it, have gone down in history for being the best to ever do it. \u00a0The two that instantly come to mind are Whitney Houston and Marvin Gaye. According to the world, Whitney sang it perfectly and Marvin\u2019s rendition was very creative.<\/p>\n The next part, \u201cI am the darker brother. They send me to eat in the kitchen when company comes, but I laugh, and eat well, and grow strong.\u201d The fact that he had to state the obvious, which was that he\u2019s the \u201cdarker brother\u201d, says a lot. It is obvious. Him saying it leads to him basically saying that having darker brothers around is embarrassing, which is why the darker brothers are sent to the kitchen to eat. I love how he turns into something positive though. Laughter is great for the soul. Good southern cooking is also great for growing healthy and strong, mentally and physically.<\/p>\n The next stanza says, \u201cTomorrow, I\u2019ll be at the table, when company comes. Nobody\u2019ll dare say to me, \u201cEat in the kitchen,\u201d Then.\u201d This simply gives me hope that with social work, determination, consistence, and time, some people won\u2019t even have the opportunity to tell us (the darker brothers) where we can and cannot sit or eat.<\/p>\n \u201cBesides, they\u2019ll see how beautiful I am and be ashamed \u2013 I, too, am America.\u201d<\/p>\n This does nothing but make my melanin smile. They\u2019ll see that the darker brother is also the talented and intelligent brother. By that point, they\u2019ll realize that they have missed out on a lot of experience.<\/p>\n The one thing that I appreciate the most is that his words have stood the test of time. They were relevant in his time period, and they still are in 2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The poem I am reviewing is I, Too Am America by Langston Hughes. I remember the first time I was introduced to this poem. I was about twelve years old, in the sixth grade, at Davis Elementary School in Greenwood, Mississippi. We were asked to research, memorize, and perform a poem for the Black History … Continue reading “I, Too ..”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6695"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6695"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6831,"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6695\/revisions\/6831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.msabrookhaven.org\/literary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}