(no subject)
it kind of seems like the counterculture is running out of ideas.
The Weary Blues
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 ain 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.
The South
The lazy, laughing South With blood on its mouth. The sunny-faced South, Beast-strong, Idiot-brained. The child-minded South Scratching in the dead fire's ashes For a Negro's bones. Cotton and the moon, Warmth, earth, warmth, The sky, the sun, the stars, The magnolia-scented South. Beautiful, like a woman, Seductive as a dark-eyed whore, Passionate, cruel, Honey-lipped, syphilitic-- That is the South. And I, who am black, would love her But she spits in my face. And I, who am black, Would give her many rare gifts But she turns her back upon me. So now I seek the North-- The cold-faced North, For she, they say, Is a kinder mistress, And in her house my children May escape the spell of the South.
The Negro Speaks Of Rivers
(To W.E.B. DuBois)
I've known rivers: I've known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. My soul has grown deep like the rivers. I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young. I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep. I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it. I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I've seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset. I've known rivers: Ancient, dusky rivers. My soul has grown deep like the rivers.