Lift Every Voice and Sing

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1900

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Symbols & Motifs

The Song

“Lift Every Voice and Sing” is an exhortation to readers and audience members to become active participants in the struggle for freedom. The poem and this idealized song are thus symbols for Black unity and resolve. In the first stanza, the speaker commands that the audience participate in this song alongside the speaker, a point James Weldon Johnson underscores through the use of the plural possessive “our” (Line 4). The speaker will only be content if others join them. The song has been many things in Black American culture—“a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us” (Line 7) and one “full of the hope that the present has bought us” (Line 8). The song is a representation of Black American history, including the past and the history the speaker and the audience are making in the present moment.

The Stony Road

The “Stony road” (Line 11) is a symbol of the adversity Black Americans have overcome. This adversity includes the historical period of enslavement when “hope unborn […] died” (Line 13) because Black Americans did not gain full liberty, despite their emancipation and short period of recognition as citizens during Reconstruction. Johnson represents Black Americans as people who have nevertheless continued marching on “weary feet” (Line 15) to arrive at their freedom in law, if not in fact. That journey to freedom has included travels through stretches of the road that are covered with “tears” (Line 16) and “the blood of the slaughtered” (Line 18), which may be references to the rise of violence against Black Americans during the historical moment of the poem. The destination at the end of this road is the “white gleam of our bright star” (Line 21)—true freedom.

The Rising Sun

The rising sun is a universal symbol for hope or rebirth. In the context of the poem, that hope is Black Americans’ desire for true freedom and recognition that they value “Liberty” (Line 3), one of the inherent rights that the founders of the United States defended when they rebelled against Great Britain. The political struggle to counter racialized violence and discriminatory laws at the turn of the 20th century is a rebirth of the spirit that drove previous generations of Black Americans to fight for their freedom.