Selected Poems of Langston Hughes Read online

My house last week.

  He said, Have you got

  A little time to speak?

  He said, I am interested

  In your soul.

  Has it been saved,

  Or is your heart stone-cold?

  I said, Reverend,

  I’ll have you know

  I was baptized

  Long ago.

  He said, What have you

  Done since then?

  I said, None of your

  Business, friend.

  He said, Sister

  Have you back-slid?

  I said, It felt good—

  If I did!

  He said, Sister,

  Come time to die,

  The Lord will surely

  Ask you why!

  I’m gonna pray

  For you!

  Goodbye!

  I felt kinder sorry

  I talked that way

  After Rev. Butler

  Went away—

  So I ain’t in no mood

  For sin today.

  Madam and Her Might-Have-Been

  I had two husbands.

  I could of had three—

  But my Might-Have-Been

  Was too good for me.

  When you grow up the hard way

  Sometimes you don’t know

  What’s too good to be true,

  Just might be so.

  He worked all the time,

  Spent his money on me—

  First time in my life

  I had anything free.

  I said, Do you love me?

  Or am I mistaken?

  You’re always giving

  And never taking.

  He said, Madam, I swear

  All I want is you.

  Right then and there

  I knowed we was through!

  I told him, Jackson,

  You better leave—

  You got some’n else

  Up your sleeve:

  When you think you got bread

  It’s always a stone—

  Nobody loves nobody

  For yourself alone.

  He said, In me

  You’ve got no trust.

  I said, I don’t want

  My heart to bust.

  Madam and the Census Man

  The census man,

  The day he came round,

  Wanted my name

  To put it down.

  I said, JOHNSON,

  ALBERTA K.

  But he hated to write

  The K that way.

  He said, What

  Does K stand for?

  I said, K—

  And nothing more.

  He said, I’m gonna put it

  K—A—Y.

  I said, If you do,

  You lie.

  My mother christened me

  ALBERTA K.

  You leave my name

  Just that way!

  He said, Mrs.,

  (With a snort)

  Just a K

  Makes your name too short.

  I said, I don’t

  Give a damn!

  Leave me and my name

  Just like I am!

  Furthermore, rub out

  That MRS., too—

  I’ll have you know

  I’m Madam to you!

  MONTAGE

  OF A

  DREAM

  DEFERRED

  Dream Boogie

  Good morning, daddy!

  Ain’t you heard

  The boogie-woogie rumble

  Of a dream deferred?

  Listen closely:

  You’ll hear their feet

  Beating out and beating out a—

      You think

      It’s a happy beat?

  Listen to it closely:

  Ain’t you heard

  something underneath

  like a—

      What did I say?

  Sure,

  I’m happy!

  Take it away!

      Hey, pop!

      Re-bop!

      Mop!

      Y-e-a-h!

  Parade

  Seven ladies

  and seventeen gentlemen

  at the Elks Club Lounge

  planning planning a parade:

  Grand Marshal in his white suit

  will lead it.

  Cadillacs with dignitaries

  will precede it.

  And behind will come

  with band and drum

  on foot … on foot …

  on foot …

  Motorcycle cops,

  white,

  will speed it

  out of sight

  if they can:

  Solid black,

  can’t be right.

  Marching … marching …

  marching …

  noon till night …

      I never knew

      that many Negroes

      were on earth,

      did you?

      I never knew!

                                          PARADE!

      A chance to let

                                          PARADE!

      the whole world see

                                          PARADE!

      old black me!

  Children’s Rhymes

  When I was a chile we used to play,

  “One—two—buckle my shoe!”

  and things like that. But now, Lord,

  listen at them little varmints!

      By what sends

      the white kids

      I ain’t sent:

      I know I can’t

      be President.

  There is two thousand children

  in this block, I do believe!

      What don’t bug

      them white kids

      sure bugs me:

      We knows everybody

      ain’t free!

  Some of these young ones is cert’ly bad—

  One batted a hard ball right through my window

  and my gold fish et the glass.

      What’s written down

      for white folks

      ain’t for us a-tall:

      “Liberty And Justice—

      Huh—For All.”

      Oop-pop-a-da!

      Skee! Daddle-de-do!

      Be-bop!

      Salt’peanuts!

      De-dop!

  Sister

  That little Negro’s married and got a kid.

  Why does he keep on foolin’ around Marie?

  Marie’s my sister—not married to me—

  But why does he keep on foolin’ around Marie?

  Why don’t she get a boy-friend

  I can understand—some decent man?

      Did it ever occur to you, son,

      the reason Marie runs around with trash

      is she wants some cash?

  Don’t decent folks have dough?

      Unfortunately usually no!

  Well, anyway, it don’t have to be a married man.

      Did it ever occur to you, boy,

      that a woman does the best she can?

                                          Comment on Stoop

  So does a man.

  Preference

  I likes a woman

  six or
eight and ten years older’n myself.

  I don’t fool with these young girls.

  Young girl’ll say,

      Daddy, I want so-and-so.

      I needs this, that, and the other.

  But a old woman’ll say,

      Honey, what does YOU need?

      I just drawed my money tonight

      and it’s all your’n.

  That’s why I likes a older woman

  who can appreciate me:

  When she conversations you

  it ain’t forever, Gimme!

  Necessity

  Work?

  I don’t have to work.

  I don’t have to do nothing

  but eat, drink, stay black, and die.

  This little old furnished room’s

  so small I can’t whip a cat

  without getting fur in my mouth

  and my landlady’s so old

  her features is all run together

  and God knows she sure can overcharge—

  Which is why I reckon I does

  have to work after all.

  Question

  Said the lady, Can you do

  what my other man can’t do—

  That is

  love me, daddy—

  and feed me, too?

                                          Figurine

                           De-dop!

  Buddy

  That kid’s my buddy,

  still and yet

  I don’t see him much.

  He works downtown for Twelve a week.

  Has to give his mother Ten—

  she says he can have

  the other Two

  to pay his carfare, buy a suit,

  coat, shoes,

  anything he wants out of it.

  Juke Box Love Song

  I could take the Harlem night

  and wrap around you,

  Take the neon lights and make a crown,

  Take the Lenox Avenue busses,

  Taxis, subways,

  And for your love song tone their rumble down.

  Take Harlem’s heartbeat,

  Make a drumbeat,

  Put it on a record, let it whirl,

  And while we listen to it play,

  Dance with you till day—

  Dance with you, my sweet brown Harlem girl.

  Ultimatum

  Baby, how come you can’t see me

  when I’m paying your bills

  each and every week?

  If you got somebody else,

  tell me—

  else I’ll cut you off

  without your rent.

  I mean

  without a cent.

  Warning

  Daddy,

  don’t let your dog

  curb you!

  Croon

  I don’t give a damn

  For Alabam’

  Even if it is my home.

  New Yorkers

  I was born here,

  that’s no lie, he said,

  right here beneath God’s sky.

  I wasn’t born here, she said,

  I come—and why?

  Where I come from

  folks work hard

  all their lives

  until they die

  and never own no parts

  of earth nor sky

  So I come up here.

  Now what’ve I got?

      You!

  She lifted up her lips

  in the dark:

  The same old spark!

  Wonder

  Early blue evening.

  Lights ain’t come on yet.

      Looky yonder!

      They come on now!

  Easy Boogie

  Down in the bass

  That steady beat

  Walking walking walking

  Like marching feet.

  Down in the bass

  That easy roll,

  Rolling like I like it

  In my soul.

      Riffs, smears, breaks.

  Hey, Lawdy, Mama!

  Do you hear what I said?

  Easy like I rock it

  In my bed!

  Movies

  The Roosevelt, Renaissance, Gem, Alhambra:

  Harlem laughing in all the wrong places

      at the crocodile tears

      of crocodile art

      that you know

      in your heart

      is crocodile:

                 (Hollywood

                 laughs at me,

                 black—

                 so I laugh

                 back.)

  Tell Me

  Why should it be my loneliness,

  Why should it be my song,

  Why should it be my dream

      deferred

      overlong?

  Not a Movie

  Well, they rocked him with road-apples

  because he tried to vote

  and whipped his head with clubs

  and he crawled on his knees to his house

  and he got the midnight train

  and he crossed that Dixie line

  now he’s livin’

  on a 133rd.

  He didn’t stop in Washington

  and he didn’t stop in Baltimore

  neither in Newark on the way.

  Six knots was on his head

  but, thank God, he wasn’t dead!

  And there ain’t no Ku Klux

  on a 133rd.

  Neon Signs

  WONDER BAR

  WISHING WELL

  MONTEREY

  MINTON’S

  (ancient altar of Thelonious)

  MANDALAY

  Spots where the booted

  and unbooted play

  SMALL’S

  CASBAH

  SHALIMAR

  Mirror-go-round

  where a broken glass

  in the early bright

  smears re-bop

  sound

  Numbers

  If I ever hit for a dollar

  gonna salt every dime away

  in the Post Office for a rainy day.

  I ain’t gonna

  play back a cent.

  (Of course, I might

  combinate a little

  with my rent.)

  What? So Soon!

                 I believe my old lady’s

                 pregnant again!

  Fate must have

  some kind of trickeration

  to populate the

  cullud nation!

                           Comment against Lamp Post

  You call it fate?

                           Figurette

  De-daddle-dy!

  De-dop!

  Motto

  I play it cool

  And dig all jive.

  That’s the reason

  I stay alive.

  My motto,

  As I live and learn,

        is:

  Dig And Be Dug

  In Return.

  Dead in There

  Sometimes

  A night funeral

  Going by

  Carries home

  A cool bop daddy.

  Hearse and flowers

  Guarantee

  He’ll never hype

  Another paddy.

  It’s hard to believe,

  But dead in
there,

  He’ll never lay a

  Hype nowhere!

  He’s my ace-boy,

  Gone away.

  Wake up and live!

  He used to say.

  Squares

  Who couldn’t dig him,

  Plant him now—

  Out where it makes

  No diff’ no how.

  Situation

  When I rolled three 7’s

  in a row

  I was scared to walk out

  with the dough.

  Dancer

  Two or three things in the past

  failed him

  that had not failed people

  of lesser genius.

  In the first place

  he didn’t have much sense.

  He was no good at making love

  and no good at making money.

  So he tapped,

      trucked,

      boogied,

      sanded,

      jittered,

  until he made folks say,

      Looky yonder

      at that boy!

      Hey!

  But being no good at lovin’—

  the girls left him.