How did Langston Hughes use blues forms in his poetry?

Langston Hughes was a central figure of the Harlem Renaissance who sought to create a uniquely Black literature by drawing directly from the experiences and cultural expressions of the African American working class.123

Hughes turned to the blues as a poetic form to capture the aesthetic sensibilities, needs, and desires of this community. By incorporating the structure and spirit of blues music into his work—most notably in his collections The Weary Blues (1926) and Fine Clothes to the Jew (1927)—he moved away from traditional English literary forms to build an artistic project rooted in the lives of the "Negro masses".43

In these poems, Hughes often adopted working-class personae, utilizing the lyrical, expressive nature of the blues to articulate feelings rather than strictly narrative storytelling. This approach allowed him to validate the folk heritage of oppressed people and provide an authentic alternative to the bourgeois values and stereotypes that often influenced how Black life was represented in literature at the time.435