can someone explain the theme of the light of gandhi’s lamp for me? can you also explain why the girls sister anita was in jail? this is very confusing.

I think the theme is the cruelty and sometimes the inmorality of racist acts and activism .Growing up in this Apartheid era affected the author in such a way that she used The light of Ghandi´s lamp to express how unfair this world was with black people and continues to be. Being equal, having equal rights or seeking to have them should not be a reason to be put in jail.The girl´s sister is arrested because she is part of an anti- apartheid group and she participated in protests. At first she thinks it is wrong to have the intention to overthrow a government but then understands , with her sister in prison, that the only thing people are fighting for is equal rights.

the answer is:  

he is voicing feelings shared by all humans regardless of race.

in paul laurence dunbar's poem "we wear the mask," he replicates the words mask and we to emphasize how people in general -not just black americans- hide their true feelings. he suggests the masks cover people's faces and eyes, which are the main parts that display their emotions. he also thinks people's pain conceal behind those masks, so that they cannot see reality and nobody is able to see one another's sorrow.