"As I Grew Older"

Langston Hughes's "As I Grew Older" reflects the regressive graph of the poet's dreams as he grew older. The graph appeared to be inversely proportional to the progression of time.

Langston Hughes’s “As I Grew Older” represents not only his growth in stature, but the obstacles to his growth as an individual, and a member of society. The purpose of Life for a person is defined by his dream.

He states that “It was a long time ago” that his dream existed. The lines that begin like a fairy tale point to a fairy tale existence--- the aspiration of a black in a white-dominated society.

The dream at the moment was right in front of him, an ‘in the face aspect’. It is likened to the sun.

The comparison is apt, as the Sun stands for sunshine, brightness, the warmth of life and

rays of hope. The light of the Sun also seemed to show him the way.

Subsequently, the poet brings in the metaphor of the Wall that grew when he was supposed to grow in its place.

The wall referred to here is the wall of Apartheid, the invisible but sophisticated barrier.

The wall is emblematic of boundaries, and barriers, and marginalization and

segregation, as in Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall’.

While people have introduced the wall, as a symbol of civilization; according to Frost it was an eloquent symbol for regression.

The poet Langston Hughes asserts how the wall rose slowly here, he reiterated the word ‘slowly’ to stress its devious method of segregation. It eventually separates Langston Hughes from his dream

permanently. When it should have been the dream touching the horizon, Hughes portrays the Wall as touching the sky.’

Poem Analysis“As I Grew Older,”

by Langston Hughes carries an optimistic theme that no matter what stands in the way of someone’s dream you can always find your dream and fight for it.

Throughout the poem, Hughes refers to different symbols to show the barriers between blacks and whites in society.

In the first stanza of this poem, Hughes writes that his dream was: “in front of me,

bright like a sun—My dream.” Hughes’s dream is the dream of a non racist society in America and the freedom for anyone to do what they choose and be treated equally.

At the same time, Hughes’s dream can also be treated as Hughes’s future. Hughes’s dream first appeared to be “bright like the sun” because when you’re a child, you aren’t aware of what’s actually happening

around you. Children don’t know the true reasons for why their community is the way that it is and Hughes’s didn’t understand either. Hughes’s dream was bright because he wasn’t old enough to realize that there

would be things in his way keeping him from his dream.

Hughes’s dream describes how he wishes to have a good life and raise a family without the conflicts that he’s experienced in his

own childhood. Also, it’s important to note that Hughes’s says “My dream” to show possession of the idea he holds. This is later related to other possessions Hughes’s describes in his poem.

Another reason why Hughes’s writes “my dream” is because Hughes’s dream was different from a white man at the time. Facing discrimination throughout his life, Hughes’s continues to describe racism when Hughes’s writes

“And then a wall rose, rose slowly, slowly, between me and my dream.”

The wall Hughes’s refers to is the wall of white men and how they dominated life in the United States. This wall “slowly”

blocked his dream. Hughes’s describes the blockage as slow to show the many small efforts people used to keep America segregated.

In the third stanza, Hughes’s writes that the wall “rose until it

touched the sky--. The wall. Shadow. I am black. I lie down in the shadow.” There are many things going on in this stanza that illustrates Hughes’s place in society at that time and the extent of racism.

The audience should notice that Hughes’s first writes that the wall rose up to touch the sky in a single line but he then breaks up the words in the following lines to act as if the action was taking place with

the words. First Hughes’s describes what is moving up and he writes on a single line, “The Wall.”

Then Hughes’s continues to describe what happens when the wall is in place

and that’s “Shadow.” In the third single line Hughes’s confirms (if not already known), “I am black.” This simple description is then followed by a single line with, “I lie down in the shadow.” “The Wall” that Hughes’s describes is

a symbol of the white people who were racist against blacks. This wall cast a “shadow” over Hughes and this shadow represents the restrictions and laws that were made in discrimination against black people.

Once the shadow is created, Hughes’s writes: “I am black,” which is literally the current state of his shadowed atmosphere but more so the fact that Hughes’s is African American. Then he tells the reader that

he’s lying down in the shadow. This shadow is describing the lower conditions that African American’s had to live with in the midst of segregated America.

Hughes’s ends this stanza by saying “No

longer the light of my dream before me, above me.” Since his dream is no longer above him, the dream is beneath him. This can be interpreted as saying that the dream of freedom and equality is unrealistic or it’s saying that the

dream has been temporarily disabled because of the wall created by white people.

In order to break free of his restrictions, Hughes describes his “dark hands” that will be

able to “break through the wall,” and “find his dream. The dark hands Hughes describes is his culture and his own people.

His dark hands can be seen as the colour of the skin but also the fact that the

blacks were enslaved by many whites in the early history of America. These dark hands can be interpreted to be hands that have bleed and worked and covered with dirt to show that hard work and constant

repression of black society has made them strong.

In the last stanza, Hughes says that these hands can: “help me shatter this darkness, to smash this night, to break this shadow into a

thousand lights of the sun, into a thousand whirling dreams of sun!”

Hughes believes that with perseverance that African Americans can break through the wall created by white

people and find their dreams.