Langston Hughes Tacks

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Life doesn’t feel bad for anyone, so when life gets hard you just have to keep persevering. “It’s had its tacks in it”, said Langston Hughes. This line is early in the poem and sets the tone for the rest of it. I believe by making the comparison of life to a staircase it makes the imagery in the reader's mind more appealing than if she had just said “life has its ups and downs. Perseverance through tough times is definitely one of the life skills everyone needs to acquire. Langston Hughes wrote this poem because of his own tough childhood. “So boy don’t you turn back”, relates to when Langston ran away to Mexico to practice law. I believe he is talking from his mother’s point of view and telling the “son”(him) to go chase their dreams. He also is making sure the mother tells the son to not ever second guess himself and to commit to what he’s doing to do the best possible job. The two lines “It’s had its tacks in it, And splinters”, is referring to when Hughes grew up in the early 1900’s. The tacks and splinters are the racial prejudices he had being African American. Prejudices caused him to run away to study law. I believe he handled the racism well, instead of violently fighting, he fled somewhere else to do what he wanted too. He also wrote this poem, I believe, too inspire other young minorities to let nothing, like racism, hold them back. Langston Hughes wrote this poem to…show more content…
Most people would agree that life is “ no crystal stair”. Hughes relates to the common reader, even though this poem is older. Life is still tough for people and a very small percentage are born into wealth and have to do nothing to succeed. Most people have to work hard and through challenges to get where they are. I think that Hughes made the right choice trying to connect to regular people as more people can connect to the poem, which is the goal of
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