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?

–Langston Hughes

This poem makes no sense at all if taken literally, as I did when I first encountered it. If not taken literally, you can tell the metaphors for the different emotional states one may be in if one could not achieve one's dream. This poem gains a deeper meaneing when one takes in to account the title, Harlem. This shows the poem is directed at poor, black, disadvantaged people.