Jazz Poems
CHASING THE BIRD
The sun sets unevenly and the people
go to bed.
The night has a thousand eyes.
The clouds are low, overhead.
Every night it is a little bit
more difficult, a little
harder. My mind
to me a mangle is.
ROBERT CREELEY
from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
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Jazz Poems
CHARLIE PARKER BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION, TOMPKINS SQUARE PARK
I was telling you about that junkie wannabefrom Wall Street who OD’ed last week
on Explosion 2000 on that street corner
right over there when KABOOM! You kissed me
smack on the lips just as “Confirmation” kicked in.
Just as Venusin two-toned dreadlocks and a skin-tight
smock danced from the band shell with her pet python,
Bodyguard, to “All the Things You Are.”
Just as punk rockers rocked, in-flowered on sheets,
sipped smoothies and smoked,
Their hair spirited to pastel auras, rosehip,
Island lime, a shade of blue just washed by rain.
Just as Ukraine checkmated, as twins seesawed,
As bikers cracked smiles in the Hari-Hari, the slap-
tongue of sax. At the mommies and the poppies. Just as.
And they were doing the brothers in descending order.
The three brothers Heath: Percy, Jimmy, call him “Little Bird,”
And Albert “Tootie” Heath. With Milt Jackson on vibes,
three score and twelve, and still working. Two boys in love
Grooved, one in white pants and sailor hat,
the other in a buffalo nickel belt that bedazzled.
They sat on the park bench eating falafel.
A man with one leg sold charms for a dollar. For luck.
For the music that day and the light, you could say it
was all bell-bottomed and swaybacked. Young-like.
And your kiss. All at once I was riding a sparkling gold Schwinn bike.
Something in my head went from full torpor to starburst:
as if whetted by some wild vibranto, your kiss,
the vibes’ licks cleared my vision of fizz for an instant.
What had been all Midnight Dragon was now
a Tropicana-Pure-Premium-sharpened C
delivered as of this morning to the Santa Barbara Deli
and Superetti down the street. Just like that.
In your arms and the music and the light, I thought I might
>go plumb or Penteostal, lay down on the grass, recite
Kahlil, take up knitting, eat pickles and marry you–
Tell that priest to stop playing Frisbee with the lab
so we can say our vows right here and now before “Tenor Madness”
ends! Opps! I forget we’re already married! Just as.
CATHERINE BOWMAN
from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
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Jazz Poems
HERE WHERE COLTRANE IS
Soul and race
are private dominions
memories and modal
songs, a tenor blossoming,
which would paint suffering
a clear color, but is not in
this Victorian house
without oil in zero degree
weather and a forty-mile-an-hour wind;
it is all a well-knit family:
a love supreme.
Oak leaves pile up on walkway
and steps, catholic as apples
in a special mist of clear white
children who love my children.
I play”Alabama”
on a warped record player
skipping the scratches
on your faces over the fibrous
conical hairs of plastic
under the wooden floors.
Dreaming on a train from New York
to Philly, your hand out six
notes which become an anthem
to our memories of you:
oak, birch, maple,
apple, cocoa, rubber.
For this reason Martin is dead;
for this reason Malcolm is dead;
for this reason Coltrane is dead;
in the eyes of my first son are the browns
of these men and their music.
MICHAEL S. HARPER | 1938 ~ 2016
from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
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Jazz Poems
FOR OUR LADY
yehbillie if someone
had loved u like u
shud have been loved
ain’t no tellen what
kind of songs
u wud have swung
gainst this country’s wite mind
or what kind of lyrics
wud have pushed us from
our blue / nites
yeh billie
if some blk / man
had reallee
made u feel
permanentlee warm
ain’t no tellen
where the jazz of yo/songs
wud have led us.
SONIA SANCHEZ
from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
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Jazz Poems
ART PEPPER
It’s the broken phrases, the fury inside him.
Squiggling alto saxophone playing out rickets
And jaundice, a mother who tried to kill him
In her womb with a coat hanger, a faltering
God-like father. The past is a bruised cloud
Floating over the houses like a prophecy,
The terrible foghorns off the shore at San Pedro.
Lightning without thunder. Years without playing.
Years of blowing out smoke and inhaling fire,
Junk and cold turkey, smacking up, the habit
Of cooking powder in spoons, the eyedroppers,
The spikes. Tracks on both arms. Tattoos.
The hospital cells at Fort Worth, the wire cages
In the L.A. County, the hole at San Quentin.
And always the blunt instrument of sex, the pain
Bubbling up inside him like a wound, the small
Deaths. The wind piercing the sheer skin
Of a dark lake at dawn. The streets at 5 a.m.
After a cool rain. The smoky blue clubs.
The chords of Parker, of Young, of Coltrane.
Playing solo means going on alone, improvising,
Hitting the notes, ringing the changes,
It’s clipped phrasing and dry ice in summer,
Straining against the rhythms, speeding it up,
Loping forward and looping back, finding the curl
In the wave, the mood in the air. It’s
Splintered tones and furious double timing.
It’s leaving the other instruments on stage
And blowing freedom into the night, into the faces
Of emptiness that peer along the bar, ghosts
Shallow hulls of nothingness, Hatred of God.
Hatred of white skin that never turns black.
Hatred of Patti, of Dianne, of Christine.
A daughter who grew up without him, a stranger.
Years of being strung out, years without speaking.
Pauses and intervals, silence. A fog rolling
Across the ocean, foghorns in the distance.
A lighthouse rising from the underworld.
A moon swelling in the clouds, an informer,
A twisted white mouth of light. Scars carved
And criscrossed on his chest. The memory
Of nodding out, the dazed drop-off into sleep.
And then the curious joy of surviving, joy
Of waking up in a dusky room to a gush
Of fresh notes, a tremoring sheet of sound.
Jamming again. Careening through the scales
For the creatures who haunt the night.
Bopping through the streets in a half-light
With Laurie on his arm, a witness, a believer.
The night is going to burst inside him.
The wind is going to break loose forever
From his lungs. It’s the fury of improvising,
Of going on alone. It’s the fierce clarity
Of each note coming to an end, distinct,
Glistening. The alto’s full-bodied laughter
The white grief-stricken wail.
EDWARD HIRSCH
from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
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