Langston Hughes Quotes: 20

• Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.

• Hold fast to dreams,For if dreams dieLife is a broken-winged bird,That cannot fly.

• Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air and you.

• Humor is laughing at what you haven't got when you ought to have it.

• Life is for the living.Death is for the dead.Let life be like music. And death a note unsaid.

  The Collected Poems

• An artist must be free to choose what he does, certainly, but he must also never be afraid to do what he might choose.

• Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby.

• I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go.

• I went down to the river,I set down on the bank.I tried to think but couldn't,So I jumped in and sank.

• Well, I like to eat, sleep, drink, and be in love.I like to work, read, learn, and understand life.

• Looks like what drives me crazyDon't have no effect on you--But I'm gonna keep on at itTill it drives you crazy, too.

  Selected Poems

• HarlemWhat happens to a dream deferred?Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore-- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet?Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.Or does it explode?

  The Collected Poems

• I stay cool, and dig all jive,That's the way I stay alive.My motto, as I live and learn, isDig and be dugIn return.

• Oh, God of Dust and Rainbows,Help us to seeThat without the dust the rainbowWould not be.

• Though you may hear me holler,And you may see me cry--I'll be dogged, sweet baby,If you gonna see me die.

• So since I'm still here livin',I guess I will live on.I could've died for love--But for livin' I was born.

  Selected Poems

• I've known rivers:I've known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins.My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

• Out of love,No regrets--Though the goodnessBe wasted forever.Out of love,No regrets--Though the returnBe never.

  Selected Poems

• Yet the ivory gods, And the ebony gods, And the gods of diamond-jade, Are only silly puppet gods That people themselves Have made.-

• Cheap little rhymesA cheap little tuneAre sometimes as dangerousAs a sliver of the moon.