BRIDGING TEXT AND CONTEXT

THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE POEM ''AS I GREW OLDER'' AND THE SONG ''EBONY AND IVORY''

The song "As I Grew Older" talks about a child with dreams on better place to live in, that as he grew older he understood that this is impossible to fulfill his dreams. An wall rose up between the speaker and his dream, until it touched the sky. The speaker wants to broke this thick and tall wall but he can't because of his black hands. This showed situation represents at us metaphorical an social barrier that there is in front of the black people that trying be contained in the society where they live. As we know, the writer is Langston Hughes, and in his own life he exposed to gaps, discrimination and even racism against the African-American race.
The writer dreamed about racial equality, and he shows his fighting by the writing and literature.

While Hughes talks about broken dreams, there are the song "Ebony and Ivory" that represents the wanted and unfounded reality with using metaphorically two materials whom we can realize clearly their difference by their color appearance - black&white.
With this used metaphor the speaker tells that there is a way live together in a perfect harmony although the difference. "why don't we?" - this question making us think about the social problem  as something that could be solved. The ebony and the ivory that lives together on a piano symbol way not only to live together, but rather create a perfect harmony.
The speaker tells us optimistically  that we can actually connect and unit each race to other.