It’s been 50 years to the day that the 1963 March on Washington culminated with Rev. Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, facing the crowd that had gathered east of the memorial on the Washington Mall.

I was only four years old at the time, and while I do remember JFK’s funeral procession on TV that November, I don’t remember seeing this event unfolding. (Hey, my Twitter account wasn’t yet active…)

Dr. King said, in part:

I say to you today, my friends, though, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream the one day this nation will rise up, live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

…

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.

Fifty years on, has this dream been realized? Or is it a dream deferred?

This is not a judgment; it’s an open question. While there have been huge strides in civil rights since the 1963 march, have we – as a nation/world – evolved? How about for other minorities, such as LGBT individuals or women.

Or Muslims in the US.

Or the issues over illegal immigrants that has (thankfully) bubbled to the surface over the last year or so.

And so on.

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, Harlem