Example 2:Fellow citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! Whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, today, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully remember those bleeding children of sorry this day, "may my right hand cleave to the roof of my mouth"!
Contemporary Text:
Let America Be America Again by Langston Hughes.
Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Analysis of Contemporary Connection: In the 1950-60s there was a man by the name of Martin Luther King. He was fighting for civil rights of African Americans during this time period of segregation. Even though slavery was over; African Americans were still being treated as less than nothing because of the color of their skin. So to Langston Hughes America truly didn't stand for freedom either.
Analysis of Passage: On this day of Independence Day he can't celebrate because he knows not everyone is free. It is more so a sad day for him. A reminder that some of his own friends and relatives are still slaves and in fact not free. Which is what Independence Day stood for.