{"id":5017,"date":"2025-07-31T19:47:35","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T23:47:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/?p=5017"},"modified":"2025-07-31T19:47:36","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T23:47:36","slug":"a-poem-for-a-thursday-309","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/2025\/07\/31\/a-poem-for-a-thursday-309\/","title":{"rendered":"A Poem for a Thursday #309"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/johnny-briggs-zbfyAE76fcc-unsplash-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5019\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Photo by <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/@johnnyboylee?utm_content=creditCopyText&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=unsplash\">Johnny Briggs<\/a> on <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/photos\/a-close-up-of-an-old-fashioned-typewriter-zbfyAE76fcc?utm_content=creditCopyText&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=unsplash\">Unsplash<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Langston Hughes was a part of the Harlem Renaissance. He was a poet but also wrote novels, short stories, essays, and plays. Hughes tried to portray the realities of working-class Black lives. He said, &#8220;We younger Negro artists who create now intend to express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame. If white people are pleased we are glad. If they are not, it doesn&#8217;t matter. We know we are beautiful. And ugly too.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-verse\">Dream-singers,<br>Story-tellers,<br>Dancers,<br>Loud Laughers in the hands of Fate\u2014<br>     My people.<br>Dish-washers,<br>Elevator-boys,<br>Ladies' maids,<br>Crap-shooters,<br>Cooks,<br>Waiters,<br>Jazzers,<br>Nurses of babies,<br>Loaders of ships,<br>Rounders,<br>Number writers,<br>Comedians in vaudeville<br>And band-men in circuses\u2014<br>Dream-singers all,\u2014\u2014<br>     My people.<br>Story-tellers all,\u2014<br>My people.<br>     Dancers\u2014<br>God! What dancers!<br>     Singers\u2014<br>God! What singers!<br>Singers and dancers<br>Dancers and laughers<br>     Laughers?<br>Yes, laughers . . . laughers . . . laughers\u2014<br>Loud-mouthed laughers in the hands<br>     Of Fate.<br><br>Laughers<br>Langston Hughes<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Langston Hughes was a part of the Harlem Renaissance. He was a poet but also wrote novels, short stories, essays, and plays. Hughes tried to portray the realities of working-class Black lives. He said, &#8220;We younger Negro artists who create now intend to express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame. If white people are pleased we are glad. If they are not, it doesn&#8217;t matter. We know we are beautiful. And ugly too.&#8221; Dream-singers,Story-tellers,Dancers,Loud Laughers in the hands of Fate\u2014 My people.Dish-washers,Elevator-boys,Ladies&#8217; maids,Crap-shooters,Cooks,Waiters,Jazzers,Nurses of babies,Loaders of ships,Rounders,Number writers,Comedians in vaudevilleAnd band-men in circuses\u2014Dream-singers all,\u2014\u2014 My people.Story-tellers all,\u2014My people. Dancers\u2014God! What dancers! Singers\u2014God! What singers!Singers and dancersDancers and laughers Laughers?Yes, laughers . . . laughers . . . laughers\u2014Loud-mouthed laughers in the hands Of Fate.LaughersLangston Hughes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5019,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poem-for-a-thursday"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5017"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5020,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5017\/revisions\/5020"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.holdsuponhappiness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}