When peoples care for you and cry for you, they can straighten out your soul

Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air and you

Humor is laughing at what you haven't got when you ought to have it

What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up - like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore - And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over - like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags - like a heavy lead

Hold fast to dreams for if dreams die, life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly

Hold fast to dreams, For if dreams die, Life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly, Hold fast to dreams, For if dreams go, Life is a barren field, Frozen with snow

Hold fast to your dreams, for without them life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly

America never was America to me And yet I swear this oath America will be!

But there are certain very practical things American Negro writers can do. And must do. There's a song that says, the time ain't long. That song is right. Something has got to change in America—and change soon. We must help that change to come

Beauty for some provides escape, who gain a happiness in eying the gorgeous buttocks of the ape or Autumn sunsets exquisitely dying.