In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned

Thats made America the land it has become.

O, Im the man who sailed those early seas

In search of what I meant to be my home--

For Im the one who left dark Irelands shore,

And Polands plain, and Englands grassy lea,

And torn from Black Africas strand I came

To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?

Surely not me? The millions on relief today?

The millions shot down when we strike?

The millions who have nothing for our pay?

For all the dreams weve dreamed

And all the songs weve sung

And all the hopes weve held

And all the flags weve hung,

The millions who have nothing for our pay--

Except the dream thats almost dead today.

O, let America be America again--

The land that never has been yet--

And yet must be--the land where every man is free.

The land thats mine--the poor mans, Indians, Negros, ME--

Who made America,

Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,

Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,

Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--

The steel of freedom does not stain.

From those who live like leeches on the peoples lives,

We must take back our land again,

America!

O, yes,

I say it plain,

America never was America to me,

And yet I swear this oath--

America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,

The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,

We, the people, must redeem

The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.

The mountains and the endless plain--

All, all the stretch of these great green states--

And make America again!

Langston Hughes