Does the speaker seem genuine when he recommended wearing the mask

- The poem symbolizes false appearances.

Explanation:

The poem called "We wear the mask" was written by Paul Laurence Dunbar during the late 1800s. This poem represents people who have false appearances and cleverly hide their real faces under a false appearance.

The poem refers to the masks that hide the faces of African - American people because they hide their real feelings behind a mask with a smile.

Among the literary devices Dunbar uses in "We Wear the Mask" is metaphor. The last stanza seems to suggest that the speakers are slaves; however, the lines can also be applicable African-Americans of Dunbar's time, during the Jim Crow era.