Reading Response 7: As I Grew Older

This poem I found, “As I Grow older” by Langston Hughes holds something close to my heart. It’s about him having a dream, breaking through barriers due to the color of his skin and then finding it as he grew. Hughes talks about how he once had a dream, almost forgotten, but it was right in front of him “bright like a sun”. He goes on to talk about a wall rising slowly between him and his dream, which I interpret as it being his skin color. Langston Hughes grew up in the slavery era and constantly bounced from one Midwestern small town to another and was always faced with mistreatment because he was African-American. He even faced discrimination in school when he was voted class poet because supposedly “All Negroes have rhythm.” Hughes goes on in the poem to talk about the wall reaching the sky and casting a shadow in which he laid down in. He accepted being in the background and in everyone else’s shadow because he felt that’s where he belonged. When he realized that he deserved better, he decided to “break through the wall” with his “dark hands” and reclaim his dream. This part was especially inspirational for me because I find myself constantly having to break barriers that others have set for me and prove to myself that I am more than just a color. With my color, I can achieve more and I can reach the light like Langston Hughes did. Once he broke through the wall and shattered the darkness, he found “a thousand lights of sun…a thousand whirling dreams of sun!” I figured that if he can find his dreams through the darkness, then I can seek mine out!

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/as-i-grew-older/