Abel Meeropol & Langston Hughes:Strange Dream

Lately in class, we have been reading/ analyzing Harlem Renaissance poetry (esp. Langston Hughes' "Harlem" and listening to protest music (esp. Marion Anderson's "My Country 'Tis of Thee" and Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" of the 1930's...this led to my strange dream of last night!

Langston Hughes
1902-1967

Abel Meeropol
1903-1986

In my dream (no kidding!), Abel Meeropol and Langston Hughes were sitting together at Cafe Society (a night club) in Greenwich Village and doing "freestyle poetry" together...I have put Hughes' verses in bold print:


What happens to a dream deferred?

Southern trees bear strange fruit, blood on the leaves and blood at the root.

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?

Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze, strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Or fester like a sore - and then run?

Pastoral scene of the gallant south, the bulging eyes and the twisted mouth.

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh, then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Or crust and sugar over - like syrupy sweet?

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck, for the rain to gather, for the wind to suck.

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop, here is a strange and bitter crop.

Or does it explode?



I woke up thinking...I wish Billie Holiday and Nina Simone would've been there to sing it as a duet!