Selected Poems of Langston Hughes Read online

(When you’re no good for dough they go.)

  With no sense, just wonderful feet,

  What could possibly be all-reet?

  Did he get anywhere? No!

  Even a great dancer

  can’t C.P.T.

  a show.

  Advice

  Folks, I’m telling you,

  birthing is hard

  and dying is mean—

  so get yourself

  a little loving

  in between.

  Green Memory

  A wonderful time—the War:

  when money rolled in

  and blood rolled out.

      But blood

      was far away

      from here—

  Money was near.

  Wine-O

  Setting in the wine-house

  Soaking up a wine-souse

  Waiting for tomorrow to come—

  Then

  Setting in the wine-house

  Soaking up a new souse.

  Tomorrow …

  Oh, hum!

  Relief

  My heart is aching

  for them Poles and Greeks

  on relief way across the sea

  because I was on relief

  once in 1933.

  I know what relief can be—

  it took me two years to get on WPA.

  If the war hadn’t come along

  I wouldn’t be out the barrel yet.

  Now, I’m almost back in the barrel again.

  To tell the truth,

  if these white folks want to go ahead

  and fight another war,

  or even two,

  the one to stop ’em won’t be me.

  Would you?

  Ballad of the Landlord

  Landlord, landlord,

  My roof has sprung a leak.

  Don’t you ’member I told you about it

  Way last week?

  Landlord, landlord,

  These steps is broken down.

  When you come up yourself

  It’s a wonder you don’t fall down.

  Ten Bucks you say I owe you?

  Ten Bucks you say is due?

  Well, that’s Ten Bucks more’n I’ll pay you

  Till you fix this house up new.

  What? You gonna get eviction orders?

  You gonna cut off my heat?

  You gonna take my furniture and

  Throw it in the street?

  Um-huh! You talking high and mighty.

  Talk on—till you get through.

  You ain’t gonna be able to say a word

  If I land my fist on you.

  Police! Police!

  Come and get this man!

  He’s trying to ruin the government

  And overturn the land!

  Copper’s whistle!

  Patrol bell!

  Arrest.

  Precinct Station.

  Iron cell.

  Headlines in press:

  MAN THREATENS LANDLORD

  TENANT HELD NO BAIL

  JUDGE GIVES NEGRO 90 DAYS IN COUNTY JAIL

  Corner Meeting

  Ladder, flag, and amplifier:

  what the soap box

  used to be.

  The speaker catches fire

  looking at their faces.

  His words

  jump down to stand

  in listeners’ places.

  Projection

  On the day when the Savoy

  leaps clean over to Seventh Avenue

  and starts jitterbugging

  with the Renaissance,

  on that day when Abyssinia Baptist Church

  throws her enormous arms around

  St. James Presbyterian

  and 409 Edgecombe

  stoops to kiss 12 West 133rd,

  on that day—

  Do, Jesus!

  Manhattan Island will whirl

  like a Dizzy Gillespie transcription

  played by Inez and Timme.

  On that day, Lord,

  Sammy Davis and Marian Anderson

  will sing a duet,

  Paul Robeson

  will team up with Jackie Mabley,

  and Father Divine will say in truth,

                 Peace!

                 It’s truly

                 wonderful!

  Flatted Fifths

  Little cullud boys with beards

  re-bop be-bop mop and stop.

  Little cullud boys with fears,

  frantic, kick their draftee years

  into flatted fifths and flatter beers

  that at a sudden change become

  sparkling Oriental wines

  rich and strange

  silken bathrobes with gold twines

  and Heilbroner, Crawford,

  Nat-undreamed-of Lewis combines

  in silver thread and diamond notes

  on trade-marks inside

  Howard coats.

  Little cullud boys in berets

      oop pop-a-da

  horse a fantasy of days

      ool ya koo

  and dig all plays.

  Tomorrow

      Tomorrow may be

      a thousand years off:

  TWO DIMES AND A NICKLE ONLY

      says this particular

      cigarette machine.

  Others take a quarter straight.

      Some dawns

      wait

  Mellow

  Into the laps

  of black celebrities

  white girls fall

  like pale plums from a tree

  beyond a high tension wall

  wired for killing

  which makes it

  more thrilling.

  Live and Let Live

  Maybe it ain’t right—

  but the people of the night

      will give even

      a snake

      a break.

  Gauge

  Hemp …

  A stick …

  A roach …

  Straw …

  Bar

  That whiskey will cook the egg.

      Say not so!

      Maybe the egg

      will cook the whiskey.

  You ought to know!

  Café: 3 A.M.

  Detectives from the vice squad

  with weary sadistic eyes

  spotting fairies.

      Degenerates,

      some folks say.

      But God, Nature,

      or somebody

      made them that way.

  Police lady or Lesbian

  over there?

      Where?

  Drunkard

  Voice grows thicker

  as song grows stronger

  as time grows longer until day

  trying to forget to remember

  the taste of day.

  Street Song

  Jack, if you got to be a rounder

  Be a rounder right—

  Just don’t let mama catch you

  Makin’ rounds at night.

  125th Street

  Face like a chocolate bar

  full of nuts and sweet.

  Face like a jack-o’-lantern,

  candle inside.

  Face like slice of melon,

  grin that wide.

  Dive

  Lenox Avenue

  by daylight

  runs to dive in the Park

  but faster …

  faster …

  after dark.

  Warning: Augmented

  Don’t let your dog curb you!

      Curb your doggie

      Like you ought to do,

>   But don’t let that dog curb you!

      You may play folks cheap,

      Act rough and tough,

      But a dog can tell

      When you’re full of stuff.

      Them little old mutts

      Look all scraggly and bad,

      But they got more sense

      Than some people ever had.

  Cur dog, fice dog, kerry blue—

  Just don’t let your dog curb you!

  Up-Beat

  In the gutter

  boys who try

  might meet girls

  on the fly

  as out of the gutter

  girls who will

  may meet boys

  copping a thrill

  while from the gutter

  both can rise:

  But it requires

  plenty eyes.

  Jam Session

  Letting midnight

  out on bail

      pop-a-da

  having been

  detained in jail

      oop-pop-a-da

  for sprinkling salt

  on a dreamer’s tail

      pop-a-da

  Be-Bop Boys

  Imploring Mecca

  to achieve

  six discs

  with Decca.

  Tag

  Little cullud boys

      with fears,

      frantic,

  nudge their draftee years.

      Pop-a-da!

  Theme for English B

  The instructor said,

      Go home and write

      a page tonight

      And let that page come out of you—

      Then, it will be true.

  I wonder if it’s that simple?

  I am twenty-two, colored, born in Winston-Salem.

  I went to school there, then Durham, then here

  to this college on the hill above Harlem.

  I am the only colored student in my class.

  The steps from the hill lead down into Harlem,

  through a park, then I cross St. Nicholas,

  Eighth Avenue, Seventh, and I come to the Y,

  the Harlem Branch Y, where I take the elevator

  up to my room, sit down, and write this page:

  It’s not easy to know what is true for you or me

  at twenty-two, my age. But I guess I’m what

  I feel and see and hear, Harlem, I hear you:

  hear you, hear me—we two—you, me, talk on this page.

  (I hear New York, too.) Me—who?

  Well, I like to eat, sleep, drink, and be in love.

  I like to work, read, learn, and understand life.

  I like a pipe for a Christmas present,

  or records—Bessie, bop, or Bach.

  I guess being colored doesn’t make me not like

  the same things other folks like who are other races.

  So will my page be colored that I write?

  Being me, it will not be white.

  But it will be

  a part of you, instructor.

  You are white—

  yet a part of me, as I am a part of you.

  That’s American.

  Sometimes perhaps you don’t want to be a part of me

  Nor do I often want to be a part of you.

  But we are, that’s true!

  As I learn from you,

  I guess you learn from me—

  although you’re older—and white—

  and somewhat more free.

  This is my page for English B.

  College Formal: Renaissance Casino

  Golden girl

  in a golden gown

  in a melody night

  in Harlem town

  lad tall and brown

  tall and wise

  college boy smart

  eyes in eyes

  the music wraps

  them both around

  in mellow magic

  of dancing sound

  till they’re the heart

  of the whole big town

  gold and brown

  Low to High

  How can you forget me?

  But you do!

  You said you was gonna take me

  Up with you—

  Now you’ve got your Cadillac,

  you done forgot that you are black.

  How can you forget me

  When I’m you?

  But you do.

  How can you forget me,

  fellow, say?

  How can you low-rate me

  this way?

  You treat me like you damn well please,

  Ignore me—though I pay your fees.

  How can you forget me?

  But you do.

  Boogie: 1 a.m.

  Good evening, daddy!

  I know you’ve heard

  The boogie-woogie rumble

  Of a dream deferred

  Trilling the treble

  And twining the bass

  Into midnight ruffles

  Of cat-gut lace.

  High to Low

  God knows

  We have our troubles, too—

  One trouble is you:

  you talk too loud,

  cuss too loud,

  look too black,

  don’t get anywhere,

  and sometimes it seems

  you don’t even care.

  The way you send your kids to school

  stockings down,

  (not Ethical Culture)

  the way you shout out loud in church,

  (not St. Phillips)

  and the way you lounge on doorsteps

  just as if you were down South,

  (not at 409)

  the way you clown—

  the way, in other words,

  you let me down—

  me, trying to uphold the race

  and you—

  well, you can see,

  we have our problems,

  too, with you.

  Lady’s Boogie

  See that lady

  Dressed so fine?

  She ain’t got boogie-woogie

  On her mind—

  But if she was to listen

  I bet she’d hear,

  Way up in the treble

  The tingle of a tear.

      Be-Bach!

  So Long

  So long

  is in the song

  and it’s in the way you’re gone

  but it’s like a foreign language

  in my mind

  and maybe was I blind

  I could not see

  and would not know

  you’re gone so long

  so long.

  Deferred

  This year, maybe, do you think I can graduate?

  I’m already two years late.

  Dropped out six months when I was seven,

  a year when I was eleven,

  then got put back when we come North.

  To get through high at twenty’s kind of late—

  But maybe this year I can graduate.

  Maybe now I can have that white enamel stove

  I dreamed about when we first fell in love

  eighteen years ago.

  But you know,

  rooming and everything

  then kids,

  cold-water flat and all that.

  But now my daughter’s married

  And my boy’s most grown—

  quit school to work—

  and where we’re moving

  there ain’t no stove—

  Maybe I can buy that white enamel stove!

  Me, I always did want to study French.

  It don’t make sense—

  I’ll never go to France,

  but night schools teach French.

  Now at last I’ve go
t a job

  where I get off at five,

  in time to wash and dress,

  so, si’l-vous plait, I’ll study French!

  Someday,

  I’m gonna buy two new suits

  at once!

  All I want is

  one more bottle of gin.

  All I want is to see

  my furniture paid for.

  All I want is a wife who will

  work with me and not against me. Say,

  baby, could you see your way clear?

  Heaven, heaven, is my home!

  This world I’ll leave behind

  When I set my feet in glory

  I’ll have a throne for mine]

  I want to pass the civil service.

  I want a television set.

  You know, as old as I am,

  I ain’t never

  owned a decent radio yet?

  I’d like to take up Bach.

      Montage

      of a dream

      deferred.

  Buddy, have you heard?

  Request

  Gimme $25.00

  and the change.

  I’m going

  where the morning

  and the evening

  won’t bother me.

  Shame on You

  If you’re great enough

  and clever enough

  the government might honor you.

  But the people will forget—

  Except on holidays.