{"id":263,"date":"2004-12-05T06:04:00","date_gmt":"2004-12-05T14:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/the-weary-blues\/"},"modified":"2004-12-05T06:04:00","modified_gmt":"2004-12-05T14:04:00","slug":"the-weary-blues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/2004\/12\/05\/the-weary-blues\/","title":{"rendered":"The Weary Blues"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By <a href=\"http:\/\/www.poets.org\/poems\/poems.cfm?prmID=1476\">Langston Hughes<\/a>. <\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,<br \/>\n<br \/>Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,<br \/>\n<br \/>        \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I heard a Negro play.<br \/>\n<br \/>Down on Lenox Avenue the other night<br \/>\n<br \/>By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light<br \/>\n<br \/>        \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He did a lazy sway . . .<br \/>\n<br \/>        \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He did a lazy sway . . .<br \/>\n<br \/>To the tune o&#8217; those Weary Blues.<br \/>\n<br \/>With his ebony hands on each ivory key<br \/>\n<br \/>He made that poor piano moan with melody.<br \/>\n<br \/>        \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0O Blues!<br \/>\n<br \/>Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool<\/p>\n<p>He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.<br \/>\n<br \/>   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Sweet Blues!<br \/>\n<br \/>Coming from a black man&#8217;s soul.<br \/>\n<br \/>   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0O Blues!<br \/>\n<br \/>In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone<br \/>\n<br \/>I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan&#8211;<br \/>\n<br \/>   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0&#8220;Ain&#8217;t got nobody in all this world,<br \/>\n<br \/>   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Ain&#8217;t got nobody but ma self.<br \/>\n<br \/>   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I&#8217;s gwine to quit ma frownin&#8217;<br \/>\n<br \/>   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And put ma troubles on the shelf.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.<br \/>\n<br \/>He played a few chords then he sang some more&#8211;<br \/>\n<br \/> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0&#8220;I got the Weary Blues<br \/>\n<br \/> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And I can&#8217;t be satisfied.<br \/>\n<br \/> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Got the Weary Blues<br \/>\n<br \/> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And can&#8217;t be satisfied&#8211;<br \/>\n<br \/> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I ain&#8217;t happy no mo&#8217;<br \/>\n<br \/> \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0And I wish that I had died.&#8221;<br \/>\n<br \/>And far into the night he crooned that tune.<br \/>\n<br \/>The stars went out and so did the moon.<br \/>\n<br \/>The singer stopped playing and went to bed<br \/>\n<br \/>While the Weary Blues echoed through his head.<br \/>\n<br \/>He slept like a rock or a man that&#8217;s dead.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>  You can also <a href=\"http:\/\/www.geocities.com\/xxxjorgexxx\/a05.html\">listen<\/a> to the poem read by the author, with music by Leonard Feather.<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Langston Hughes. Droning a drowsy syncopated tune, Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I heard a Negro play. Down on Lenox Avenue the other night By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He did a lazy sway . . . \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0He did a lazy sway . . . To [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellany"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}