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Title: The weary blues
Author: Langston Hughes
Contributor: Carl Van Vechten
Release date: November 16, 2024 [eBook #74745]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: Alfred A. Knopf
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WEARY BLUES ***
Transcriber’s Notes
Misspelled words have been corrected. These are identified by
♦♠♥♣ symbols in the text and are shown immediately below the
paragraph or section in which they appear.
Details and other notes may be found at the end of this eBook.
THE WEARY BLUES
_by_
LANGSTON HUGHES
_WITH AN INTRODUCTON BY CARL VAN VECHTEN_
[Illustration: logo]
NEW YORK
ALFRED · A · KNOPF
1926
THE WEARY BLUES
COPYRIGHT, 1926, BY ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC · SET UP, ELECTROTYPED AND
PRINTED BY THE VAIL-BALLOU PRESS, INC., BINGHAMTON, N. Y. · ESPARTO
PAPER MANUFACTURED IN SCOTLAND AND FURNISHED BY W. F. ETHERINGTON &
CO., NEW YORK · BOUND BY THE H. WOLFF ESTATE, NEW YORK.
MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO MY MOTHER
I wish to thank the editors of _The Crisis_, _Opportunity_, _Survey
Graphic_, _Vanity Fair_, _The World Tomorrow_ and _The Amsterdam News_
for having first published some of the poems in this book.
INTRODUCING LANGSTON HUGHES TO THE READER
_I_
_At the moment I cannot recall the name of any other person whatever
who, at the age of twenty-three, has enjoyed so picturesque and
rambling an existence as Langston Hughes. Indeed, a complete account
of his disorderly and delightfully fantastic career would make a
fascinating picaresque romance which I hope this young Negro will
write before so much more befalls him that he may find it difficult to
capture all the salient episodes within the limits of a single volume._
_Born on February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri, he had lived, before
his twelfth year, in the City of Mexico, Topeka, Kansas, Colorado
Springs, Charlestown, Indiana, Kansas City, and Buffalo. He attended
Central High School, from which he graduated, at Cleveland, Ohio,
while in the summer, there and in Chicago, he worked as delivery- and
dummy-boy in hat-stores. In his senior year he was elected class poet
and editor of the Year Book._
_After four years in Cleveland, he once more joined his father
in Mexico, only to migrate to New York where he entered Columbia
University. There, finding the environment distasteful, or worse, he
remained till spring, when he quit, broke with his father and, with
thirteen dollars in cash, went on his own. First, he worked for a
truck-farmer on Staten Island; next, he delivered flowers for Thorley;
at length he partially satisfied an insatiable craving to go to sea by
signing up with an old ship anchored in the Hudson for the winter. His
first real cruise as a sailor carried him to the Canary Islands, the
Azores, and the West Coast of Africa, of which voyage he has written:
“Oh, the sun in Dakar! Oh, the little black girls of Burutu! Oh, the
blue, blue bay of Loanda! Calabar, the city lost in a forest; the long,
shining days at sea, the masts rocking against the stars at night;
the black Kru-boy sailors, taken at Freetown, bathing on deck morning
and evening; Tom Pey and Haneo, whose dangerous job it was to dive
under the seven-ton mahogany logs floating and bobbing at the ship’s
side and fasten them to the chains of the crane; the vile houses of
rotting women at Lagos; the desolation of the Congo; Johnny Walker,
and the millions of whisky bottles buried in the sea along the West
Coast; the daily fights on board, officers, sailors, everybody drunk;
the timorous, frightened missionaries we carried as passengers; and
George, the Kentucky colored boy, dancing and singing the Blues on the
after-deck under the stars.”_
_Returning to New York with plenty of money and a monkey, he presently
shipped again—this time for Holland. Again he came back to New York and
again he sailed—on his twenty-second birthday: February 1, 1924. Three
weeks later he found himself in Paris with less than seven dollars.
However, he was soon provided for: a woman of his own race engaged him
as doorman at her boîte de nuit. Later he was employed, first as second
cook, then as waiter, at the Grand Duc, where the Negro entertainer,
Florence, sang at this epoch. Here he made friends with an Italian
family who carried him off to their villa at Desenzano on Lago di
Garda where he passed a happy month, followed by a night in Verona
and a week in Venice. On his way back across Italy his passport was
stolen and he became a beach-comber in Genoa. He has described his
life there to me: “Wine and figs and pasta. And sunlight! And amusing
companions, dozens of other beach-combers roving the dockyards and
water-front streets, getting their heads whacked by the Fascisti, and
breaking one loaf of bread into so many pieces that nobody got more
than a crumb. I lived in the public gardens along the water-front and
slept in the Albergo Populare for two lire a night amidst the snores
of hundreds of other derelicts.... I painted my way home as a sailor.
It seems that I must have painted the whole ship myself. We made a
regular ‘grand tour’: Livorno, Napoli (we passed so close to Capri I
could have cried). Then all around Sicily—Catania, Messina, Palermo—the
Lipari Islands, miserable little peaks of pumice stone out in the sea;
then across to Spain, divine Spain! My buddy and I went on a spree in
Valencia for a night and a day.... Oh, the sweet wine of Valencia!”_
_He arrived in New York on November 10, 1924. That evening I attended a
dance given in Harlem by the National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People. Some time during the course of the night, Walter
White asked me to meet two young Negro poets. He introduced me to
Countée Cullen and Langston Hughes. Before that moment I had never
heard of either of them._
_II_
_I have merely sketched a primitive outline of a career as rich in
adventures as a fruit-cake is full of raisins. I have already
stated that I hope Langston Hughes may be persuaded to set it down
on paper in the minutest detail, for the bull-fights in Mexico, the
drunken gaiety of the Grand Duc, the delicately exquisite grace of the
little black girls at Burutu, the exotic languor of the Spanish women
at Valencia, the barbaric jazz dances of the cabarets in New York’s own
Harlem, the companionship of sailors of many races and nationalities,
all have stamped an indelible impression on the highly sensitized,
poetic imagination of this young Negro, an impression which has found
its initial expression in the poems assembled in this book._
_And also herein may be discerned that nostalgia for color and warmth
and beauty which explains this boy’s nomadic instincts._
_“We should have a land of sun,
Of gorgeous sun,
And a land of fragrant water
Where the twilight
Is a soft bandanna handkerchief
Of rose and gold,
And not this land where life is cold,”_
_he sings. Again, he tells his dream:_
_“To fling my arms wide
In the face of the sun,
Dance! whirl! whirl!
Till the quick day is done.
Rest at pale evening....
A tall, slim tree....
Night coming tenderly.
Black like me.”_
_More of this wistful longing may be discovered in the poems entitled_
The South _and_ As I Grew Older. _His verses, however, are by no means
limited to an exclusive mood; he writes caressingly of little black
prostitutes in Harlem; his cabaret songs throb with the true jazz
rhythm; his sea-pieces ache with a calm, melancholy lyricism; he cries
bitterly from the heart of his race in_ Cross _and_ The Jester; _he
sighs, in one of the most successful of his fragile poems, over the
loss of a loved friend. Always, however, his stanzas are subjective,
personal. They are the (I had almost said informal, for they have a
highly deceptive air of spontaneous improvisation) expression of an
essentially sensitive and subtly illusive nature, seeking always to
break through the veil that obscures for him, at least in some degree,
the ultimate needs of that nature._
_To the Negro race in America, since the day when Phillis Wheatley
indited lines to General George Washington and other aristocratic
figures (for Phillis Wheatley never sang “My way’s cloudy,” or “By an
by, I’m goin to lay down dis heavy load”) there have been born many
poets. Paul Laurence Dunbar, James Weldon Johnson, Claude McKay, Jean
Toomer, Georgia Douglas Johnson, Countée Cullen, are a few of the more
memorable names. Not the least of these names, I think, is that of
Langston Hughes, and perhaps his adventures and personality offer the
promise of as rich a fulfillment as has been the lot of any of the
others._
Carl Van Vechten.
_New York._
_August 3, 1925._
CONTENTS
Introducing Langston Hughes to the reader ♦9
_by Carl Van Vechten_
Proem ♠19
THE WEARY BLUES
The Weary Blues 23
Jazzonia 25
Negro Dancers 26
The Cat and the Saxophone 27
Young Singer 28
Cabaret 29
To Midnight Nan at Leroy’s 30
To a Little Lover-Lass, Dead 31
Harlem Night Club 32
Nude Young Dancer 33
Young Prostitute 34
To a Black Dancer 35
Song for a Banjo Dance 36
Blues Fantasy 37
Lenox Avenue: Midnight 39
DREAM VARIATIONS
Dream Variations 43
Winter Moon 44
Poème d’Automne 45
Fantasy in Purple 46
March Moon 47
Joy 48
THE NEGRO SPEAKS OF RIVERS
The Negro Speaks of Rivers ♥51
Cross 52
The Jester 53
The South 54
As I Grew Older 55
Aunt Sue’s Stories 57
Poem 58
A BLACK PIERROT
A Black Pierrot 61
Harlem Night Song 62
Songs to the Dark Virgin 63
Ardella 64
Poem—To the Black Beloved 65
When Sue Wears Red 66
Pierrot 67
WATER FRONT STREETS
Water Front Streets 71
A Farewell 72
Long Trip 73
Port Town 74
Sea Calm 75
Caribbean Sunset 76
Young Sailor 77
Seascape 78
Natcha 79
Sea Charm 80
Death of an Old Seaman 81
SHADOWS IN THE SUN
Beggar Boy 85
Troubled Woman 86
Suicide’s Note 87
Sick Room 88
Soledad 89
To the Dark Mercedes 90
Mexican Market Woman 91
After Many Springs 92
Young Bride 93
The Dream Keeper 94
Poem (To F. S.) 95
OUR LAND
Our Land 99
Lament for Dark Peoples 100
Afraid 101
Poem—For the Portrait of an African Boy 102
Summer Night 103
Disillusion 104
Danse Africaine 105
The White Ones 106
Mother to Son 107
Poem 108
Epilogue 109
♦ “15” replaced with “9”
♠ “13” replaced with “19”
♥ “50” replaced with “51”
PROEM
I am a Negro:
Black as the night is black,
Black like the depths of my Africa.
I’ve been a slave:
Caesar told me to keep his door-steps clean.
I brushed the boots of Washington.
I’ve been a worker:
Under my hand the pyramids arose.
I made mortar for the Woolworth Building.
I’ve been a singer:
All the way from Africa to Georgia
I carried my sorrow songs.
I made ragtime.
I’ve been a victim:
The Belgians cut off my hands in the Congo.
They lynch me now in Texas.
I am a Negro:
Black as the night is black,
Black like the depths of my Africa.
THE WEARY BLUES
THE WEARY BLUES
Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,
Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,
I heard a Negro play.
Down on Lenox Avenue the other night
By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light
He did a lazy sway....
He did a lazy sway....
To the tune o’ those Weary Blues.
With his ebony hands on each ivory key
He made that poor piano moan with melody.
O Blues!
Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool
He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.
Sweet Blues!
Coming from a black man’s soul.
O Blues!
In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone
I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan—
“Ain’t got nobody in all this world,
Ain’t got nobody but ma self.
I’s gwine to quit ma frownin’
And put ma troubles on the shelf.”
Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.
He played a few chords then he sang some more—
“I got the Weary Blues
And I can’t be satisfied.
Got the Weary Blues
And can’t be satisfied—
I ain’t happy no mo’
And I wish that I had died.”
And far into the night he crooned that tune.
The stars went out and so did the moon.
The singer stopped playing and went to bed
While the Weary Blues echoed through his head.
He slept like a rock or a man that’s dead.
JAZZONIA
Oh, silver tree!
Oh, shining rivers of the soul!
In a Harlem cabaret
Six long-headed jazzers play.
A dancing girl whose eyes are bold
Lifts high a dress of silken gold.
Oh, singing tree!
Oh, shining rivers of the soul!
Were Eve’s eyes
In the first garden
Just a bit too bold?
Was Cleopatra gorgeous
In a gown of gold?
Oh, shining tree!
Oh, silver rivers of the soul!
In a whirling cabaret
Six long-headed jazzers play.
NEGRO DANCERS
“Me an’ ma baby’s
Got two mo’ ways,
Two mo’ ways to do de buck!
Da, da,
Da, da, da!
Two mo’ ways to do de buck!”
Soft light on the tables,
Music gay,
Brown-skin steppers
In a cabaret.
White folks, laugh!
White folks, pray!
“Me an’ ma baby’s
Got two mo’ ways,
Two mo’ ways to do de buck!”
THE CAT AND THE SAXOPHONE (2 A.M.)
EVERYBODY
Half-pint,—
Gin?
No, make it
LOVES MY BABY
corn. You like
liquor,
don’t you, honey?
BUT MY BABY
Sure. Kiss me,
DON’T LOVE NOBODY
daddy.
BUT ME.
Say!
EVERYBODY
Yes?
WANTS MY BABY
I’m your
BUT MY BABY
sweetie, ain’t I?
DON’T WANT NOBODY
Sure.
BUT
Then let’s
ME,
do it!
SWEET ME.
Charleston,
mamma!
!
YOUNG SINGER
One who sings “chansons vulgaires”
In a Harlem cellar
Where the jazz-band plays
From dark to dawn
Would not understand
Should you tell her
That she is like a nymph
For some wild faun.
CABARET
Does a jazz-band ever sob?
They say a jazz-band’s gay.
Yet as the vulgar dancers whirled
And the wan night wore away,
One said she heard the jazz-band sob
When the little dawn was grey.
TO MIDNIGHT NAN AT LEROY’S
Strut and wiggle,
Shameless gal.
Wouldn’t no good fellow
Be your pal.
_Hear dat music....
Jungle night.
Hear dat music....
And the moon was white._
Sing your Blues song,
Pretty baby.
You want lovin’
And you don’t mean maybe.
_Jungle lover....
Night black boy....
Two against the moon
And the moon was joy._
Strut and wiggle,
Shameless Nan.
Wouldn’t no good fellow
Be your man.
TO A LITTLE LOVER-LASS, DEAD
She
Who searched for lovers
In the night
Has gone the quiet way
Into the still,
Dark land of death
Beyond the rim of day.
Now like a little lonely waif
She walks
An endless street
And gives her kiss to nothingness.
Would God his lips were sweet!
HARLEM NIGHT CLUB
Sleek black boys in a cabaret.
Jazz-band, jazz-band,—
Play, plAY, PLAY!
Tomorrow....who knows?
Dance today!
White girls’ eyes
Call gay black boys.
Black boys’ lips
Grin jungle joys.
Dark brown girls
In blond men’s arms.
Jazz-band, jazz-band,—
Sing Eve’s charms!
White ones, brown ones,
What do you know
About tomorrow
Where all paths go?
Jazz-boys, jazz-boys,—
Play, plAY, PLAY!
Tomorrow....is darkness.
Joy today!
NUDE YOUNG DANCER
What jungle tree have you slept under,
Midnight dancer of the jazzy hour?
What great forest has hung its perfume
Like a sweet veil about your bower?
What jungle tree have you slept under,
Night-dark girl of the swaying hips?
What star-white moon has been your mother?
To what clean boy have you offered your lips?
YOUNG PROSTITUTE
Her dark brown face
Is like a withered flower
On a broken stem.
Those kind come cheap in Harlem
So they say.
TO A BLACK DANCER IN “THE LITTLE SAVOY”
Wine-maiden
Of the jazz-tuned night,
Lips
Sweet as purple dew,
Breasts
Like the pillows of all sweet dreams,
Who crushed
The grapes of joy
And dripped their juice
On you?
SONG FOR A BANJO DANCE
Shake your brown feet, honey,
Shake your brown feet, chile,
Shake your brown feet, honey,
Shake ’em swift and wil’—
Get way back, honey,
Do that low-down step.
Walk on over, darling,
Now! Come out
With your left.
Shake your brown feet, honey,
Shake ’em, honey chile.
Sun’s going down this evening—
Might never rise no mo’.
The sun’s going down this very night—
Might never rise no mo’—
So dance with swift feet, honey,
(The banjo’s sobbing low)
Dance with swift feet, honey—
Might never dance no mo’.
Shake your brown feet, Liza,
Shake ’em, Liza, chile,
Shake your brown feet, Liza,
(The music’s soft and wil’)
Shake your brown feet, Liza,
(The banjo’s sobbing low)
The sun’s going down this very night—
Might never rise no mo’.
BLUES FANTASY
Hey! Hey!
That’s what the
Blues singers say.
Singing minor melodies
They laugh,
Hey! Hey!
My man’s done left me,
Chile, he’s gone away.
My good man’s left me,
Babe, he’s gone away.
Now the cryin’ blues
Haunts me night and day.
Hey!...Hey!
Weary,
Weary,
Trouble, pain.
Sun’s gonna shine
Somewhere
Again.
I got a railroad ticket,
Pack my trunk and ride.
Sing ’em, sister!
Got a railroad ticket,
Pack my trunk and ride.
And when I get on the train
I’ll cast my blues aside.
Laughing,
Hey!...Hey!
Laugh a loud,
Hey! Hey!
LENOX AVENUE: MIDNIGHT
The rhythm of life
Is a jazz rhythm,
Honey.
The gods are laughing at us.
The broken heart of love,
The weary, weary heart of pain,—
Overtones,
Undertones,
To the rumble of street cars,
To the swish of rain.
Lenox Avenue,
Honey.
Midnight,
And the gods are laughing at us.
DREAM VARIATIONS
♦DREAM VARIATIONS
To fling my arms wide
In some place of the sun,
To whirl and to dance
Till the white day is done.
Then rest at cool evening
Beneath a tall tree
While night comes on gently,
Dark like me,—
That is my dream!
To fling my arms wide
In the face of the sun,
Dance! whirl! whirl!
Till the quick day is done.
Rest at pale evening....
A tall, slim tree....
Night coming tenderly
Black like me.
♦ “DREAM VARIATION” replaced with “DREAM VARIATIONS”
WINTER MOON
How thin and sharp is the moon tonight!
How thin and sharp and ghostly white
Is the slim curved crook of the moon tonight!
POÈME D’AUTOMNE
The autumn leaves
Are too heavy with color.
The slender trees
On the Vulcan Road
Are dressed in scarlet and gold
Like young courtesans
Waiting for their lovers.
But soon
The winter winds
Will strip their bodies bare
And then
The sharp, sleet-stung
Caresses of the cold
Will be their only
Love.
FANTASY IN PURPLE
Beat the drums of tragedy for me.
Beat the drums of tragedy and death.
And let the choir sing a stormy song
To drown the rattle of my dying breath.
Beat the drums of tragedy for me,
And let the white violins whir thin and slow,
But blow one blaring trumpet note of sun
To go with me
to the darkness
where I go.
MARCH MOON
The moon is naked.
The wind has undressed the moon.
The wind has blown all the cloud-garments
Off the body of the moon
And now she’s naked,
Stark naked.
But why don’t you blush,
O shameless moon?
Don’t you know
It isn’t nice to be naked?
JOY
I went to look for Joy,
Slim, dancing Joy,
Gay, laughing Joy,
Bright-eyed Joy,—
And I found her
Driving the butcher’s cart
In the arms of the butcher boy!
Such company, such company,
As keeps this young nymph, Joy!
THE NEGRO SPEAKS OF RIVERS
THE NEGRO SPEAKS OF RIVERS
(To W. E. B. DuBois)
I’ve known rivers:
I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of
human blood in human veins.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to
New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the
sunset.
I’ve known rivers:
Ancient, dusky rivers.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
CROSS
My old man’s a white old man
And my old mother’s black.
If ever I cursed my white old man
I take my curses back.
If ever I cursed my black old mother
And wished she were in hell,
I’m sorry for that evil wish
And now I wish her well.
My old man died in a fine big house.
My ma died in a shack.
I wonder where I’m gonna die,
Being neither white nor black?
THE JESTER
In one hand
I hold tragedy
And in the other
Comedy,—
Masks for the soul.
Laugh with me.
You would laugh!
Weep with me.
You would weep!
Tears are my laughter.
Laughter is my pain.
Cry at my grinning mouth,
If you will.
Laugh at my sorrow’s reign.
I am the Black Jester,
The dumb clown of the world,
The booted, booted fool of silly men.
Once I was wise.
Shall I be wise again?
THE SOUTH
The lazy, laughing South
With blood on its mouth.
The sunny-faced South,
Beast-strong,
Idiot-brained.
The child-minded South
Scratching in the dead fire’s ashes
For a Negro’s bones.
Cotton and the moon,
Warmth, earth, warmth,
The sky, the sun, the stars,
The magnolia-scented South.
Beautiful, like a woman,
Seductive as a dark-eyed whore,
Passionate, cruel,
Honey-lipped, syphilitic—
That is the South.
And I, who am black, would love her
But she spits in my face.
And I, who am black,
Would give her many rare gifts
But she turns her back upon me.
So now I seek the North—
The cold-faced North,
For she, they say,
Is a kinder mistress,
And in her house my children
May escape the spell of the South.
AS I GREW OLDER
It was a long time ago.
I have almost forgotten my dream.
But it was there then,
In front of me,
Bright like a sun,—
My dream.
And then the wall rose,
Rose slowly,
Slowly,
Between me and my dream.
Rose slowly, slowly,
Dimming,
Hiding,
The light of my dream.
Rose until it touched the sky,—
The wall.
Shadow.
I am black.
I lie down in the shadow.
No longer the light of my dream before me,
Above me.
Only the thick wall.
Only the shadow.
My hands!
My dark hands!
Break through the wall!
Find my dream!
Help me to shatter this darkness,
To smash this night,
To break this shadow
Into a thousand lights of sun,
Into a thousand whirling dreams
Of sun!
AUNT SUE’S STORIES
Aunt Sue has a head full of stories.
Aunt Sue has a whole heart full of stories.
Summer nights on the front porch
Aunt Sue cuddles a brown-faced child to her bosom
And tells him stories.
Black slaves
Working in the hot sun,
And black slaves
Walking in the dewy night,
And black slaves
Singing sorrow songs on the banks of a mighty river
Mingle themselves softly
In the flow of old Aunt Sue’s voice,
Mingle themselves softly
In the dark shadows that cross and recross
Aunt Sue’s stories.
And the dark-faced child, listening,
Knows that Aunt Sue’s stories are real stories.
He knows that Aunt Sue
Never got her stories out of any book at all,
But that they came
Right out of her own life.
And the dark-faced child is quiet
Of a summer night
Listening to Aunt Sue’s stories.
POEM
The night is beautiful,
So the faces of my people.
The stars are beautiful,
So the eyes of my people.
Beautiful, also, is the sun.
Beautiful, also, are the souls of my people.
BLACK PIERROT
A BLACK PIERROT
I am a black Pierrot:
She did not love me,
So I crept away into the night
And the night was black, too.
I am a black Pierrot:
She did not love me,
So I wept until the red dawn
Dripped blood over the eastern hills
And my heart was bleeding, too.
I am a black Pierrot:
She did not love me,
So with my once gay-colored soul
Shrunken like a balloon without air,
I went forth in the morning
To seek a new brown love.
HARLEM NIGHT SONG
Come,
Let us roam the night together
Singing.
I love you.
Across
The Harlem roof-tops
Moon is shining.
Night sky is blue.
Stars are great drops
Of golden dew.
In the cabaret
The jazz-band’s playing.
I love you.
Come,
Let us roam the night together
Singing.
SONGS TO THE DARK VIRGIN
I
Would
That I were a jewel,
A shattered jewel,
That all my shining brilliants
Might fall at thy feet,
Thou dark one.
II
Would
That I were a garment,
A shimmering, silken garment,
That all my folds
Might wrap about thy body,
Absorb thy body,
Hold and hide thy body,
Thou dark one.
III
Would
That I were a flame,
But one sharp, leaping flame
To annihilate thy body,
Thou dark one.
ARDELLA
I would liken you
To a night without stars
Were it not for your eyes.
I would liken you
To a sleep without dreams
Were it not for your songs.
POEM
To the Black Beloved
Ah,
My black one,
Thou art not beautiful
Yet thou hast
A loveliness
Surpassing beauty.
Oh,
My black one,
Thou art not good
Yet thou hast
A purity
Surpassing goodness.
Ah,
My black one,
Thou art not luminous
Yet an altar of jewels,
An altar of shimmering jewels,
Would pale in the light
Of thy darkness,
Pale in the light
Of thy nightness.
WHEN SUE WEARS RED
When Susanna Jones wears red
Her face is like an ancient cameo
Turned brown by the ages.
Come with a blast of trumpets,
Jesus!
When Susanna Jones wears red
A queen from some time-dead Egyptian night
Walks once again.
Blow trumpets, Jesus!
And the beauty of Susanna Jones in red
Burns in my heart a love-fire sharp like pain.
Sweet silver trumpets,
Jesus!
PIERROT
I work all day,
Said Simple John,
Myself a house to buy.
I work all day,
Said Simple John,
But Pierrot wondered why.
For Pierrot loved the long white road,
And Pierrot loved the moon,
And Pierrot loved a star-filled sky,
And the breath of a rose in June.
I have one wife,
Said Simple John,
And, faith, I love her yet.
I have one wife,
Said Simple John,
But Pierrot left Pierrette.
For Pierrot saw a world of girls,
And Pierrot loved each one,
And Pierrot thought all maidens fair
As flowers in the sun.
Oh, I am good,
Said Simple John,
The Lord will take me in.
Yes, I am good,
Said Simple John,
But Pierrot’s steeped in sin.
For Pierrot played on a slim guitar,
And Pierrot loved the moon,
And Pierrot ran down the long white road
With the burgher’s wife one June.
♦WATER FRONT STREETS
♦WATER FRONT STREETS
The spring is not so beautiful there,—
But dream ships sail away
To where the spring is wondrous rare
And life is gay.
The spring is not so beautiful there,—
But lads put out to sea
Who carry beauties in their hearts
And dreams, like me.
♦ “WATER-FRONT” replaced with “WATER FRONT”
A FAREWELL
With gypsies and sailors,
Wanderers of the hills and seas,
I go to seek my fortune.
With pious folk and fair
I must have a parting.
But you will not miss me,—
You who live between the hills
And have never seen the seas.
LONG TRIP
The sea is a wilderness of waves,
A desert of water.
We dip and dive,
Rise and roll,
Hide and are hidden
On the sea.
Day, night,
Night, day,
The sea is a desert of waves,
A wilderness of water.
PORT TOWN
Hello, sailor boy,
In from the sea!
Hello, sailor,
Come with me!
Come on drink cognac.
Rather have wine?
Come here, I love you.
Come and be mine.
Lights, sailor boy,
Warm, white lights.
Solid land, kid.
Wild, white nights.
Come on, sailor,
Out o’ the sea.
Let’s go, sweetie!
Come with me.
SEA CALM
How still,
How strangely still
The water is today.
It is not good
For water
To be so still that way.
CARIBBEAN SUNSET
God having a hemorrhage,
Blood coughed across the sky,
Staining the dark sea red,
That is sunset in the Caribbean.
YOUNG SAILOR
He carries
His own strength
And his own laughter,
His own today
And his own hereafter,—
This strong young sailor
Of the wide seas.
What is money for?
To spend, he says.
And wine?
To drink.
And women?
To love.
And today?
For joy.
And tomorrow?
For joy.
And the green sea
For strength,
And the brown land
For laughter.
And nothing hereafter.
SEASCAPE
Off the coast of Ireland
As our ship passed by
We saw a line of fishing ships
Etched against the sky.
Off the coast of England
As we rode the foam
We saw an Indian merchantman
Coming home.
NATCHA
Natcha, offering love.
For ten shillings offering love.
Offering: A night with me, honey.
A long, sweet night with me.
Come, drink palm wine.
Come, drink kisses.
A long, dream night with me.
SEA CHARM
Sea charm
The sea’s own children
Do not understand.
They know
But that the sea is strong
Like God’s hand.
They know
But that sea wind is sweet
Like God’s breath,
And that the sea holds
A wide, deep death.
DEATH OF AN OLD SEAMAN
We buried him high on a windy hill,
But his soul went out to sea.
I know, for I heard, when all was still,
His sea-soul say to me:
Put no tombstone at my head,
For here I do not make my bed.
Strew no flowers on my grave,
I’ve gone back to the wind and wave.
Do not, do not weep for me,
For I am happy with my sea.
SHADOWS IN THE SUN
BEGGAR BOY
What is there within this beggar lad
That I can neither hear nor feel nor see,
That I can neither know nor understand
And still it calls to me?
Is not he but a shadow in the sun—
A bit of clay, brown, ugly, given life?
And yet he plays upon his flute a wild free tune
As if Fate had not bled him with her knife!
TROUBLED WOMAN
She stands
In the quiet darkness,
This troubled woman,
Bowed by
Weariness and pain,
Like an
Autumn flower
In the frozen rain.
Like a
Wind-blown autumn flower
That never lifts its head
Again.
SUICIDE’S NOTE
The calm,
Cool face of the river
Asked me for a kiss.
SICK ROOM
How quiet
It is in this sick room
Where on the bed
A silent woman lies between two lovers—
Life and Death,
And all three covered with a sheet of pain.
SOLEDAD
A Cuban Portrait
The shadows
Of too many nights of love
Have fallen beneath your eyes.
Your eyes,
So full of pain and passion,
So full of lies.
So full of pain and passion,
Soledad,
So deeply scarred,
So still with silent cries.
TO THE DARK MERCEDES OF “EL PALACIO DE AMOR”
Mercedes is a jungle-lily in a death house.
Mercedes is a doomed star.
Mercedes is a charnel rose.
Go where gold
Will fall at the feet of your beauty,
Mercedes.
Go where they will pay you well
For your loveliness.
MEXICAN MARKET WOMAN
This ancient hag
Who sits upon the ground
Selling her scanty wares
Day in, day round,
Has known high wind-swept mountains,
And the sun has made
Her skin so brown.
AFTER MANY SPRINGS
Now,
In June,
When the night is a vast softness
Filled with blue stars,
And broken shafts of moon-glimmer
Fall upon the earth,
Am I too old to see the fairies dance?
I cannot find them any more.
YOUNG BRIDE
They say she died,—
Although I do not know,
They say she died of grief
And in the earth-dark arms of Death
Sought calm relief,
And rest from pain of love
In loveless sleep.
THE DREAM KEEPER
Bring me all of your dreams,
You dreamers.
Bring me all of your
Heart melodies
That I may wrap them
In a blue cloud-cloth
Away from the too rough fingers
Of the world.
POEM
(To F. S.)
I loved my friend.
He went away from me.
There’s nothing more to say.
The poem ends,
Soft as it began,—
I loved my friend.
OUR LAND
OUR LAND
Poem for a Decorative Panel
We should have a land of sun,
Of gorgeous sun,
And a land of fragrant water
Where the twilight
Is a soft bandanna handkerchief
Of rose and gold,
And not this land where life is cold.
We should have a land of trees,
Of tall thick trees
Bowed down with chattering parrots
Brilliant as the day,
And not this land where birds are grey.
Ah, we should have a land of joy,
Of love and joy and wine and song,
And not this land where joy is wrong.
Oh, sweet, away!
Ah, my beloved one, away!
LAMENT FOR DARK PEOPLES
I was a red man one time,
But the white men came.
I was a black man, too,
But the white men came.
They drove me out of the forest.
They took me away from the jungles.
I lost my trees.
I lost my silver moons.
Now they’ve caged me
In the circus of civilization.
Now I herd with the many—
Caged in the circus of civilization.
AFRAID
We cry among the skyscrapers
As our ancestors
Cried among the palms in Africa
Because we are alone,
It is night,
And we’re afraid.
POEM
For the portrait of an African boy after the manner of Gauguin
All the tom-toms of the jungles beat in my blood,
And all the wild hot moons of the jungles shine in my soul.
I am afraid of this civilization—
So hard,
So strong,
So cold.
SUMMER NIGHT
The sounds
Of the Harlem night
Drop one by one into stillness.
The last player-piano is closed.
The last victrola ceases with the
“Jazz Boy Blues.”
The last crying baby sleeps
And the night becomes
Still as a whispering heartbeat.
I toss
Without rest in the darkness,
Weary as the tired night,
My soul
Empty as the silence,
Empty with a vague,
Aching emptiness,
Desiring,
Needing someone,
Something.
I toss without rest
In the darkness
Until the new dawn,
Wan and pale,
Descends like a white mist
Into the court-yard.
DISILLUSION
I would be simple again,
Simple and clean
Like the earth,
Like the rain,
Nor ever know,
Dark Harlem,
The wild laughter
Of your mirth
Nor the salt tears
Of your pain.
Be kind to me,
Oh, great dark city.
Let me forget.
I will not come
To you again.
DANSE AFRICAINE
The low beating of the tom-toms,
The slow beating of the tom-toms.
Low ... slow
Slow ... low—
Stirs your blood.
Dance!
A night-veiled girl
Whirls softly into a
Circle of light.
Whirls softly ... slowly,
Like a wisp of smoke around the fire—
And the tom-toms beat,
And the tom-toms beat,
And the low beating of the tom-toms
Stirs your blood.
THE WHITE ONES
I do not hate you,
For your faces are beautiful, too.
I do not hate you,
Your faces are whirling lights of loveliness and splendor, too.
Yet why do you torture me,
O, white strong ones,
Why do you torture me?
MOTHER TO SON
Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-cimbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps
’Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now—
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
POEM
We have tomorrow
Bright before us
Like a flame.
Yesterday
A night-gone thing,
A sun-down name.
And dawn-today
Broad arch above the road we came.
EPILOGUE
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I’ll sit at the table
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,”
Then.
Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed,—
I, too, am America.
Transcriber’s Notes
1. Differences between the table of contents and the text have been
reconciled. Obsolete and alternative spellings have been left
unchanged. Grammar has not been altered.
2. Italics font is enclosed in _underscores_.
3. Illustrations are indicated by: [Illustration: caption and/or
descriptive text].
4. “Edit Distance” in Corrections table below refers to the
Levenshtein Distance.
Corrections
pg(s) Source Correction Edit
Distance
TOC 15 9 2
TOC 13 19 1
TOC 50 51 1
43 DREAM VARIATION DREAM VARIATIONS 1
69 WATER-FRONT WATER FRONT 1
71 WATER-FRONT WATER FRONT 1
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