Rhythm in Time

Langston Hughes

He sang the blues

The jazz of being black

And through his rhymes

Echoed the times

That no one wanted back.

And still today

You hear him say

Likes words

Out on the street

Don’t pay no mind

To troubled times

Just listen

To the beat -

For in the notes

Of words he wrote

He knew what could be heard

And in time

With every rhyme

We’d find his dream

Deferred.