u.s. and neighboato. the more brutal putin will become. a russian missile strike hits a barracks home. dozens of troops in mykolaiv have been killed. attacks seem to be never ending. hundreds of thousands of people in danger as they are cut off from the outside world. russia continues to shell areas around kyiv. although for now, it is holding strong with ukraine military saying the two routes into the city are cut off. ukraine s former president told me kyiv would welcome a visit from president biden. i know that president biden plans to visit europe next week. i think that he realizes the possibility.
-0:00
‘Democracy’ by Langston Hughes
Democracy will not come today, this year, nor ever through compromise and fear. I have as much right as the other fellow has to stand on my two feet, and own the land. I tire so of hearing people say let things take their course, tomorrow is another day. I do not need my freedom when I’m dead. I cannot live on tomorrows bread. Freedom is a strong seed, planted in a great need. I live here too. I want freedom just as you.
Langston Hughes used poetry to call out America’s complications and bigotries when many other poets were writing nationalistic jingles. At the same time, his poems were soundtracks for Black American life, infused with jazz and blues and the clarity of protest. That’s why Hughes’s poems are timeless: They refused to make excuses for America’s legacy of oppression, the same legacy we’re still grappling with now.