When I first read this poem, I kept thinking about how it seemedlike this was written in the 21st century instead of in the early part of the 20th century. It is quite clear that Hughes was as upset with the state of America back then as many of us are in this present time. He is questioning, like we still do, how a country that was "supposedly" discovered on equality, hope and humanity could have possibly let itself turn into such an unequal, hopeless and inhumane land. This is very puzzling to me considering that the pioneers who first fled Europe to come to America did so with the dream of making a new kind of country with a new set of values. Where are the values today? Instead, as Hughes stresses, they recreated the same issue on a different piece of land. One of the most remarkable parts of the poem is the line "O, let America be America again, the land that never has been yet, and yet must be". It is hard to figure out the concept that something that never was must be once again. It took me a minute to try to unfold the secret behid that and I came to the conclusion that these dreams of equality and freedom was put out there....but never actually there.
