The Weary Blues

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?

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.

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.

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.

Now they’ve caged me

In the circus of civilization.

Now I herd with the many—

Caged in the circus of civilization.

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.

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.

God having a hemorrhage,

Blood coughed across the sky,

Staining the dark sea red,

That is sunset in the Caribbean.

Come,

Let us roam the night together

Singing.

Beautiful, like a woman,

Seductive as a dark-eyed whore,

Passionate, cruel,

Honey-lipped, syphilitic—

That is the South.

Tears are my laughter.

Laughter is my pain.

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 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?

How thin and sharp is the moon tonight!

How thin and sharp and ghostly white

Is the slim curved crook of the moon tonight!

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?