application allows his writing to transcend from mere poetic documentation to esteemed art in its own right. With his evocations, Hughes plants and harvests his Blues aesthetic again and again. He brings incredible intelligence and poignancy to the every-day struggles of marginilization, loss, and human difficulty. Rather than simply rehashing the agony of being human (and Black) into poetic whining, however, Hughes turns pain into a beautiful process of healing by embrace. This active grasp of the human condition gives unspeakable power to his Blues aesthetic, which in turn gives power to Hughes’ overall artistic endeavor, leading his readers “far into the night [to] croon that tune” (The Weary Blues, 31). ...
