Harlem Langston Hughes New York Henry Holt and Company Book length poem 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? Good morning, daddy! I was born here, he said, watched Harlem grow until colored folks spread from river to river across the middle of Manhattan out of Penn Station dark tenth of a nation, planes from Puerto Rico, and holds of boats, chico, up from Cuba Haiti Jamaica, In buses marked New York from Georgia Florida Louisiana to Harlem Brooklyn the Bronx but most of all to Harlem dusky sash across Manhattan I've seen them come dark wondering wide-eyed dreaming out of Penn Station— but the trains are late. The gates open— Yet there're bars at each gate. What happens to a dream deferred? Daddy, ain't you heard?