We should have a land of sun,
Of gorgeous sun,
And a land of fragrant water
Where the twilight is a soft bandanna handkerchief
Of rose and gold,
And not this land
Where life is cold.
We should have a land of trees,
Of tall thick trees,
Bowed down with chattering parrots
Brilliant as the day
And not this land where the birds are gray.
Ah, we should have a land of joy,
Of love and joy and wine and song,
And not this land where joy is wrong.
Langston Hughes' poem, "Our Land," (The New Negro, 144) creates an image of a promise land/paradise that the New Negro deserves to live in. Throughout Isabel Wilkerson's The Warmth of Other Suns, the experience of the Great Migration is understood to be a journey to a safe haven for blacks in the South. Although in Wilkerson's book, the North is not described in the same terms that Hughes uses, I feel that the sentiment was quite similar.
Wilkerson describes the Great Migration as a relocation of blacks who yearned to break free from the Southern caste system and Jim Crow laws (Wilkerson, 10). George Swanson Starling moved to New York, hoping for a freer life, "to be able to live as a man and express [him]self in a manly way without the fear of getting lynched at night" (Wilkerson, 229). In Hughes' poem, he uses negative phrases to show what "our land" will not consist of, for example, "And not this land/ Where life is cold." I think that Hughes is referencing to the cold, harsh treatment of blacks in the South. The use of the word "cold" makes me think of having fearful shivers down my spine, and the mere thought of being lynched stirs the physical reaction of shivering. The land where life is cold is what blacks want to escape through migrating, and I think that Hughes successfully eluded to the bleak life conditions of the South.
Ida Mae Brandon Gladney moved to Chicago, and at first glance she thought the city "looked like Heaven" (Wilkerson, 226). Although Gladney did not go into detail about what Heaven was to her, I think that excitement and beauty that Hughes described could convey the paradisal understanding of what her haven envelops. These descriptions of the Northern cities may not appear to bring Hughes' poem to life, however the perspective that they have entered a safe space that they deserve coincides with the Hughes' promise land.
I feel like this post may seem far fetched, because I did not deconstruct the poem line by line, however in my opinion, Hughes described a fantasy that migrants had about the world beyond the South. When reading "Our Land," all I could think about was how migrants dreamed of the North fulfilling all of their hopes and wishes, saving them from the horrendous conditions of the South. Hughes composed an image of fantasy, which can serve as a means of healing and further encourage blacks to find a place that makes them feel like they deserve and belong to be there. Through that positive motivation to find "our land," Hughes creates a dialogue among blacks to migrate to a place that they can feel is their own.
I can definitely agree with your post. Your impression of the poem is exactly what I think of when I read it. To me, the poem exemplifies the dreams that people in the south have of living in the north, the land of promise. I also think that the title of the poem, "Our Land," speaks about the experiences of the south. Most Black people in the south worked on and put their every bit of energy into the land. Their blood, sweat, and tears went into making the land fertile, flourishing, and most importantly, profitable. To me, the tone of this poem is one that demonstrates a yearning for justice. I can't help but think of what I would feel if I spent countless hours hunched over, tilling and caring for land that was never really mine; never being able to lay claim on the yields of the fields. Yes, some sharecroppers, and even slaves, were allotted small plots of land in order to grow their own vegetables, but the entirety of the land still belonged to the plantation owner. This poem, to me, is a testament to the injustices of the south, and the desire to go to the north and create something for themselves. To perhaps own a house or piece of land of their own!
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your read of the poem in conjunction with the excerpt from the "Warmth of Other Suns". A major push for African Americans to migrate from the South to the North was that they knew that they deserved to live under better conditions. They knew that they should "have a land of trees" and a "land of sun". There is little room for someone to paint a pretty depiction of life in the South as an African American, where "birds are gray".
ReplyDeleteI also wrote about Ida Mae's experiences after reading a different story about her in the Warmth of Other Suns. From what I read, she did seem to experience a sort of "haven" in Chicago through a new access to voting rights. In the election of 1940, the Democratic Party heavily courted Ida Mae and other African Americans' votes. Although I don't feel that they had the best intentions, Ida Mae was still allowed some political access in this new "heaven" of Chicago.