The Poetry Stash: 06December2024

from The Weary Blues with Langston Hughes

Today’s selections are from the album The Weary Blues (UMG Recordings, Inc.). Released in 1958, the album was a collaborative project between poet Langston Hughes and musicians Charles Mingus and Leonard Feather. To listen to a few recordings, click here , here and here. To read more about jazz poetry, click here.

The Weary Blues by Langston Hughes

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.

Prompts:

1.	Begin with “Rocking back and forth…”
2.	Begin with “deep song voice…”
3.	Listen to instrumental music. Draft a poem that contains rhythms and onomatopoeia that are prompted by the music you listened to. To read more about onomatopoeia, click here.
4.	Draft a poem that includes song lyrics.

5. Photo by Steve Johnson via pexels.com. Use the image as a writing prompt.

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