“Night Funeral in Harlem” is an example of Langston Hughes’ affinity for the blues. He employs a form that includes the blues flavor, allowing the reader to hear a mournful voice that implies issues that he never actually discusses.
The speaker’s questions are more than mere decoration, and their implications attempt to make a political and sociological, as well as religious, evaluation. The poem’s form features an inconsistent conglomeration of rimed stanzas, with varied refrains.
First Stanza: “Insurance man, he did not pay”
The speaker begins with his refrain that features his subject, “Night funeral / In Harlem.” He then shoots in his first question that is ultimately insulting to the mourners. The speaker wonders, “Where did they get / Them two fine cars?” The speaker’s dialect is intended to reveal him as an intimate with the mourners, yet his questions actually separate him from them. If he is one of them, why does he have to ask where the cars come from? His concern, therefore, comes across as disingenuous.
The speaker then introduces the “insurance man,” who might be the reason for the “fine cars,” but no, the poor boy’s “insurance lapsed the other day.” Again, the speaker’s knowledge of the particulars of the situation clash; he knows the people well enough to know that their insurance lapsed, but yet not well enough to know who, in fact, is paying for the lavish funeral.
And then speaker offers a further bit of incongruity that these poor folks have managed to supply a “satin box / for [the deceased’s] head to lay.” The speaker offers these incongruities but never manages to make clear his purpose.
Second Stanza: “Them flowers came”
The speaker again introduces his next stanza with a variation on the opening refrain: “Night funeral / In Harlem: / / Who was it sent / That wreath of flowers?” Again, the speaker reveals that his distance from the mourners is so great that he has to ask about the flowers. But then he admits that he does actually know that the flowers came from “that poor boy’s friends.”
But the speaker then insults those friends by accusing them of sending them only because “They'll want flowers, too, / When they meet their ends.”
Third Stanza: “Old preacher man”
The third stanza’s opening varied refrain asks, “Who preached that / Black boy to his grave?” He reveals for the first time that the deceased is black but does not clarify why he should offer the race of the dead at this point. Has he not implied as much all along by using stereotypical Black English and placing the funeral in Harlem, which was heavily populated by African Americans at the time that the poet was writing.
The preacher is portrayed then as a money-grubber, charging five dollars to “preach[ ] that boy away,” and the poor boy’s girlfriend had to pay the preacher the five dollar charge.
Fourth Stanza: “When it was all over”
The final stanza is a rather flabby summation of what has happened during this Harlem funeral at night. The opening refrain merely reiterates the subject, “Night funeral / In Harlem.” Gone is the additional commentary as appeared in the three opening refrains, but the speaker does leave the affair on a compassionate note; at least he can admit, “It was all their tears that made / That poor boy's / Funeral grand.” Despite his probing, insulting questions, he finally realizes the importance of the event is that it showed the love the mourners had for their dearly departed.
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