To fling my arms wide
In some place of the sun,
To whirl and to dance
Till the white day is done.
Then rest at cool evening
Beneath a tall tree
While night comes on gently,
Dark like me-
That is my dream!

To fling my arms wide
In the face of the sun,
Dance! Whirl! Whirl!
Till the quick day is done.
Rest at pale evening…
A tall, slim tree…
Night coming tenderly
Black like me.

Analysis, meaning and summary of Langston Hughes's poem Dream Variations

26 Comments

  1. ram prashad says:

    He is Marvelous because he is the part of one who has started fighting against white through literature after slavery system. Also he was a member of Harlem renaissance.

  2. Raj sharma says:

    I think, that Langston Hughes is the best poet ever born. If we read his poem and try to understand the meaning then we come to know that how important message we were neglecting.He is like Arthur Doyle in detective genre,like federer in tennis, Sachin in cricket, bush in politics, picasso in art, undertaker in wrestling, Shakespeare in drama wriring. He is a ideal poet for a budding poet. He is outstanding. He is marvelous, superb, magnificient, mind-blowing, excellent, dominating, inspiring and what not. BECAUSE HE IS MY FAVOURITE……………..

  3. grace says:

    oh my goodness, thank you rodik i love this poem but i was stuck on the analysis and you literally saved me from failing my english paper!! thank you so much, if anyone is confused, look at dmitri rodiks analysis, it helps soooooo much

  4. jessiica says:

    this has to be one of the greatest poems i ever read! if your intelligent enough to comprehend what he is trying to say i think he is breally brilliant in his use of words and repition. hesz basically talking about his life as a colored man and how great it would be if the world was not prejudice and racist…kk =]

  5. henry says:

    I Love it..Keep it up.

  6. Sam says:

    I am also analyzing this as part of an english project. I found this poem with the part that is my dream in the second stanza. If you have “That is my dream!” in the second stanza, the two stanzas have identical word count, creating in essence the similarity between these two. I think that this was used to show that he was hoping that his dream of equlaity and reality would eventually become the same.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Do you have any comments, criticism, paraphrasis or analysis of this poem that you feel would assist other visitors in understanding the meaning or the theme of this poem by Langston Hughes better? If accepted, your analysis will be added to this page of American Poems. Together we can build a wealth of information, but it will take some discipline and determination.