English Department Final Exam
Fall 2021
Due Date:
By the end of Friday, Dec. 17
In the early 1930s, the poet Langston Hughes wrote a poem called “Tired,” in which he said:
I am so tired of waiting,
Aren’t you,
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
And cut the world in two –
And see what worms are eating
At the rind.
Last month, Bloomberg News reported that just three men in the U.S. – Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett – have more money than the 165 million Americans who make up the bottom 50% of the population.
They also reported that 40 million Americans need food stamps to eat, and that 25% of homeless people actually have regular jobs.
It is a fact that Cuba has a significantly longer life expectancy than the U.S.
More than half of all Americans do not have even $400 available for emergencies.
Write an essay where you connect Langston Hughes’ poem “Tired” to the economic facts listed below his poem.
Connect these two texts (the poem and the economic data) by using your personal ideas, observations and experiences.
There is no page length requirement. Write as much as you need to.
