Refugee Blues is a Blue Ballad. A form that defines his character. Ballads were popular in Ireland and Britain till 18th century while Blues were popular in African-American that originated at the end of 19th century. Auden, a British migrated to USA, blends the two techniques to bring out this beauty that sings the sorrows and sufferings of Jewish Refugees. The metre used in the poem is the same he used in his poem 'Calypso', written around the same time, 1930s. While Ballads were popular medieval forms of narrative verse while a Blue is a African-American music genre that has a rigid pattern concerning the use of repetitions and a simple rhyme scheme. In the poem, the first two lines of every stanza rhyme with each other, a target, while the third line draws a repetitive pattern, with the phrase “my dear” being repeated in every third line giving a unique uniformity to the poem. It is interesting to note that first word of every stanza is a verb. The poem is a first person narrative, in a colloquial and informal language.
