[Refrain]
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. . . .
[Refrain]
Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,
Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,
I heard a Negro play.
[Interlude]
In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone
I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan—
“Ain't got nobody in 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 my head.
He slept, but I could not;
I had a bunch of the Weary Blues myself.
Notice lines which are indented
- Lines 1,5 and 9 which contain the refrain
- Line 13 in the interlude
Indentation and Call and Response in Jazz
In Jazz, the practice of call and response uses alternation, repetition and improvisation to create a dynamic exchange between musicians. Langston Hughes' poem, The Weary Blues, incorporates similar elements through its use of indentation to demarcate call and response between singer and refrain, and through the repetition of the titular line "Got the Weary Blues".
Like the improvisatory and repetitive riffs in Jazz, Hughes captures the essence of jazz music by mimicking its rhythms, sounds, and call and response technique through the indented form the poem.