Seyhania+Pearson

 "When you look at this life you'll find It ain't nothing but a race. If you can't be the winning horse, Son at least try to place.

If they box you on the curve, boy, Jockey your way to the rail, And when you get on the inside track- Sail!...Sail!...Sail! In a race, daddy-o One thing you will find- There ain't NO way to be out in the front Without showing your tail To the horse behind." (Page 231)

Langston Hughes was an African American writer who lived during the early 1900’s. He wrote many poems and stories about black people and life for them in America. One of his stories, //Simple Speaks His Mind//, started out as a series in the New York Post and Chicago Defender. It is now part of a series of stories about a man named Simple, whose life relates very closely to the lives of black people in the 1950’s.