Poet, dramatist, lecturer, and one of the leaders of the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes, was born on February 1 in 1901. Here are two poems from early in Hughes’ career in the 1920s, when he was imagining a new style that has been described as “jazz poetry”. Following that is a song co-written with Nina Simone on her 1967 major label debut.

~Brendan