Social Discrimination: An Exposition of the Poem “The Landlord's Ballad”Landlords look down on their tenants without regard for their safety and well-being. This makes things terribly difficult for a tenant, even more so if they are black. In Langston Hughes' poem “The Ballad of The Landlord,” issues like these are present throughout the poem. In his poem Hughes allows his readers to experience racial discrimination in America and awareness of the social problems suffered by African Americans in the 1940s. The first stanza of the poem states how a tenant would tell the landlord about a problem in his apartment. The tone of the verse makes you feel sorry for the tenant. When Hughes says, “My roof has a leak. / Don't you remember that I told you about this / just last week?" (line 2 – 4), informs the reader that a landlord forgets about his tenants. Hughes' writing makes the reader reflect on his own actions and possible senses of blame for problems or people he has forgotten. The last line of the stanza prepares the reader to understand the tone of the rest of the poem “Annoyance and frustration grow when the tenant speaks in colloquial language, or slang, to his landlord of the house” (So, 2013). Although in the second verse, the tenant is diplomatic towards the interests of the landlord. Hughes says: “These steps are broken down down” (lines 6 – 8), the tenant continues to explain to the owner the conditions of the apartment and how these conditions may also affect him as he travels through the apartment building. Nonetheless, the landlord shows his authority over the tenant and demands the rent money in the third stanza of the poem. This causes exasperation in… middle of paper… situations involving minorities and how they have been discriminated against in society. This poem contains many illustrations of poetic devices. In stanzas one through six, the second and fourth lines rhyme, but everything else is inconsistent. In the final stanzas in which the landlord, the police and the press speak, the lines of the poem become short and abrupt. Allowing the reader to feel that black people were not treated equally or listened to. The line grows longer, short and long, indicating changing moods. Hughes' poem was simple and contained four voices; the tenant, the landlord, the police and the press. Hughes' poem, "The Ballad of the Landlord," truly represents the social problems experienced by blacks in the 1940s. Works CitedSo, D. (2013). The ballad of the landlord. Prezi.com/Human Rights, Retrieved May 12, 2014, from