A translation of this poem (with rhythm and rhyme sacrificed for clarity of meaning) might read as follows:
We wear the mask that grins and lies,It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—This is the price we have to pay in order to hide our real faces and emotions;We have to hide our torn and bleeding hearts with a smile,And with our mouths we have to be careful not to say the wrong things.Why should we allow the world to know our real faces,And see every sigh and tear of our sadness?No, let them only see us, whileWe wear the mask.We smile, but, O great Christ, our criesTo you we sing from tortured souls.We sing, but oh the earth is a horrible placeBeneath our feet, and the road we have to travel is long;But let the world dream otherwise and think that everything is fine,We wear the mask!
In summary, this poem, published in 1896, is about how black Americans had to put on a mask and pretend to be content with what they had and with the way they were treated. They were not allowed to show their true faces, express their own culture, or show the sadness of their hearts, because otherwise white people would punish, alienate, and abuse them even more.
In terms of the genre of the poem, we might say that it qualifies as a lyric poem. A lyric poem is typically written in the first person (Dunbar's poem is written in the first person collective, as indicated by the repetition of "We") and is an expression of personal, heartfelt emotions. The emotions in Dunbar's poem are perhaps a mixture of sadness, frustration, and anger.
There are several examples of figurative language in this poem. For example, the mask itself is not a literal mask but a symbolic mask, representing the pretenses that black Americans had to adopt in order to fit in, as best they could, to an institutionally racist white culture. The reference to "torn and bleeding hearts" is a metaphor representing how sad many black Americans were behind "the mask." The adjective "torn" also suggests that there had been a violence inflicted upon them. In the second stanza, there is a rhetorical question: "Why should the world ... count ... all our tears and sighs?" With this rhetorical question, the speaker wants to make the point that he and other black Americans should not give the world the satisfaction of seeing or knowing the measure of the sadness and pain which it has caused.
The poem has a strong rhythm, established through lots of rhyming couplets ("lies/eyes . . . guile/smile") and also through a regular syllabic meter. Every line has eight syllables, except for the final line of stanza two and the final line of stanza three, which, in both cases, is, "We wear the mask." The fact that the rhythm is interrupted makes this line, each time, stand out.
In terms of diction, the poem is full of juxtapositions. On one hand there is language like "grin," "smile," and "sing," and on the other we have "lies," "bleeding," and "tears." This constant juxtaposition of words points to the fact that black Americans had to pretend to be content and wear the mask while really being sad and in pain behind the mask.
The most obvious theme of the poem is racism and how racism has inflicted violence upon black Americans and compelled them to adopt masks to fit in, rather than allowing them to express their true selves freely.
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