Harlem

What 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?

From The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes published by Alfred A. Knopf/Vintage. Copyright © 1994 by the Estate of Langston Hughes. Permissions granted by Harold Ober Associates Incorporated. All rights reserved.