Jazz Poems

JAZZ BAND

Play that thing, you jazz mad fools!

Boil a skyscraper with a jungle

Dish it to ‘em sweet and hot—

Ahhhhhhhhh

Rip it open then, sew it up, jazz band!

Thick bass notesfrom a moon faced drum

Saxophones moan, banjo strings hum

High thin notes from the cornet’s throat

Trombone snorting, bass horn snorting

Short tan notes from the piano

And the short tan notes from the piano

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Chopin gone screwy, Wagner with the blues

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Got a date with Satan—ain’t no time to lose

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Strut it in Harlem, let Fifth Avenue shake it slow

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Ain’t goin’ to heaven nohow—

crowd up there’s too slow

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Plink, plank, plunk a plunk

Plunk

Do that thing, jazz band!

Whip it to a jelly

Sock it, rock it; heat it, beat it; then fling it at ‘em

Let the jazz stuff fall like hail on king and truck driver

queen and laundress, lord and laborer, banker and bum

Let it fall in London, Moscow, Paris, Hongkong,

Cairo, Buenos Aires, Chicago, Sidney

Let it rub hard thighs, let it be molten fire in the veins

of dancers

Make ‘em shout a crazy jargon of hot hosannas to a

Fiddle-faced jazz god

Send Dios, Jehovah, Gott, Allah, Buddha past in a high

stepping cake walk

Do that thing, jazz band!

Your music’s been drinking hard liquor

Got shanghied and it’s fightin’ mad

Stripped to the waist feedin’ ocean liner bellies

Big burly bibulous brute

Poet hands and bone crusher shoulders

Black sheep or white?

Hey, Hey!

Pick it, papa

Twee twa twee twa twa

Step on it, black boy

Do re mi fa so la ti do

Boomp boomp

Play that thing, you jazz mad fools!

FRANK MARSHALL DAVIS

from Jazz Poems | Selected and edited by Kevin Young

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