Tag: Langston Hughes

“As Befits a Man” by Langston Hughes with music by Ellis Marsalis Jr.

On By Christina's WordsIn Music, Poetry6 Comments

I don’t mind dying —
But I’d hate to die all alone!
I want a dozen pretty women
To holler, cry, and moan.

I don’t mind dying
But I want my funeral to be fine:
A row of long tall mamas
Fainting, Fanning, and crying.

I want a fish-tail hearse
And sixteen fish-tail cars,
A big brass band
And a whole truck load of flowers.

When they let me down,
Down into the clay,
I want the women to holler:
Please don’t take him away!
Ow-ooo-oo-o!
Don’t take daddy away!

“As Befits a Man,” by Langston Hughes, from Selected Poems (Vintage Books, 1974).

“He had a world view, he was always embracing the larger humanity. … not just in words, that’s who he was.” -Wynton Marsalis on his father, Ellis Marsalis Jr.

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Ellis Louis Marsalis Jr. (November 14, 1934 – April 1, 2020)

“Crossing Jordan” by Langston Hughes

On By Christina's WordsIn Music, Poetry2 Comments

It was that lonely day, folks,
When I walked by myself.
My friends was all around me
But it was just as if they’d left
I went up on a mountain
In a high cold wind
And the coat that I was wearing
Was mosquito-net thin.
Then I went down in the valley
And I crossed an icy stream
And the water I was crossing,
Was no water in a dream,
And the shoes that I was wearing
No protection for that stream.
Then I stood out on a prairie
And as far as I could see
Wasn’t nobody on that prairie
That looked like me—
Cause it was that lonely day, folks,
When I walked all by myself
And my friends was right there with me
But was just as if they’d left.
Crossing Jordan! Crossing Jordan!
Alone and by myself.

– Langston Hughes, 1941

 

via PoetryFoundation.org

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James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1902 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri.

“River” by Leon Bridges

“Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes

On By Christina's WordsIn Poetry
Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-climbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps
‘Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now—
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.

 

Langston Hughes, “Mother to Son” from Collected Poems. Copyright © 1994 by The Estate of Langston Hughes.