Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

POEM: Note to All Nazis, Fascists and Klansmen, Langston Hughes, 1943
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
29 Jan 2025
🖨️ Print Article
Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes’s 1943 poem against fascism is precise, droll, and eternal.

Some things need no introduction, no preface, no preamble, no explanatory note to provide context or history. These things speak to the moment with such clarity, and through such brevity, that to otherwise attempt to frame or explain them would take away from their inherent power. Langston Hughes’s poem “Note to All Nazis, Fascists and Klansmen” is such a thing. It is as powerful now as it must have been when first published in 1943, written with the kind of precision and wit that is eternal — and that is quintessential Langston Hughes.

Read “Note to All Nazis, Fascists and Klansmen” below.

Note to All Nazis, Fascists and Klansmen

Langston Hughes

You delight,
So it would seem,
At making mince-meat of my dream.

If you keep on,
Before you’re through,
I’ll make mince-meat
Out of you.

Langston Hughes, “Note to All Nazis, Fascists and Klansmen,” Jim Crow’s Last Stand (New York: Negro Publication Society of America, 1943

Langston Hughes
Fascism

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
The Urgent Need for the Black Radical Tradition
11 March 2026
The U.S.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: Autocracy in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Eric D. Walrond, 1923
14 January 2026
“[T]he United States on March 31, 1917,...acquired the three Danish West Indian isles…subsequently rechristened “the Virgin Islands o
Frank Chapman
How the Enemies of Our Movement Are Using the Kirk Assassination
24 September 2025
Charlie Kirk's assassination has become the pretext to accelerate a pre-existing fascist agenda, targeting a broad spectrum of forces, from lef
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
LETTER: An Open Letter to My Sister, Miss Angela Y. Davis, James Baldwin, 1970
26 February 2025
James Baldwin on white madness–and Black resistance.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
ESSAY: The Prospects for Fascism, Manning Marable, 1981
27 November 2024
Manning Marable reminds us that US fascism is institutional and normalized.
David Hundeyin
The Empire Finds An African Enemy: African Stream In The Crosshairs
25 September 2024
The state has put targets on the backs of left-wing independent media outlets it identifies as subversive.
Editors, The Black Agenda Review
TRANSCRIPT: Analyzing the Correct Method in Combating American Fascism, George Jackson, 1971
17 July 2024
Martyred Black Panther, George Jackson told us long ago that fascism has been the de facto politi
​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
For African/Black Working Class and Colonized Peoples, Midterm Elections in the U.S. Offer No Relief from War, Repression and Capitalist Misery
10 July 2024
This article was
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Jeanelle K. Hope and Bill V. Mullen’s Book, “The Black Antifascist Tradition”
29 May 2024
In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book.
Chicago racist terror of 1919
Abayomi Azikiwe
Cultural Renaissance, Economic Crises and the Struggle Against Fascism, 1919-1945
06 March 2024
In the time between the two imperialist wars, the spirit and politics of Pan-Africanism grew.

More Stories


  • Joy James speaking on a panel at the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice's Carceral State Reading
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Joy James’ Book, “New Bones Abolition”
    13 Dec 2023
    In this series, we ask acclaimed authors to answer five questions about their book. This week’s featured author is Joy James. Dr. James is Ebenezer Fitch Professor of Humanities at Williams College.…
  • Mia Mottley of the Barbados Labor Party
    Keston K. Perry
    The Mirage of Mia Mottley’s ‘Progressive’ Politics
    13 Dec 2023
    Despite the praise she receives for being the “progressive” leader needed in the Caribbean, Mia Mottley and her policies in Barbados and her work within CARICOM have not veered outside the realm of…
  • Henry Kissinger
    K.J. Noh 
    Question the Narrative that Villanizes Henry Kissinger: Correcting the memory of the obsequious butler of US empire
    13 Dec 2023
    Kissinger is known as either the epitome of a statesman or the most hated man on the planet due to the atrocities committed under his leadership or advisement. However, the weight of these acts…
  • Anima Adjepong
    Book Review: Race to be Myself
    13 Dec 2023
    Anima Adjepong reviews the book "Race to Be Myself" by Caster Semeya, a South African Track and Field star whose gender was questioned by national sporting institutions.
  • Two square rectangles, one with the word "fact", the other with the word "opinion"
    Dr.Wilmer J. Leon, III
    You Are Entitled to Your Opinion, Not Your Own Facts
    13 Dec 2023
    During the genocide in Palestine, we have seen an extraordinary amount of propaganda in the form of media control and lies from government officials. However, the reality of this atrocity has shifted…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us