Jazz Poems

FILLING THE GAP When Bird died, I didn’t mind I had things to do— polish some shoes, practive a high school cha-cha-cha. I didn’t even know Clifford was dead: I must have been lobbing an oblong ball beside the gymnasium. I saw the Lady right before she died— dried, brittle as last year’s gardenia. I let her scratch an autograph. But not Pres. Too bugged to boo, I left as Basie’s brass booted him off the stand in a sick reunion— tottering , saxophone dragging himmlike a stage-hook. When I read Dr. Williams’ poem, “Stormy,” I wrote a letter of love and praise and didn’t mail it. After he died, it burned my desk like a delinquent prescription… I don’t like to mourn the dead: what didn’t, never will. And I sometimes feel foolish staying up late, trying to squeeze some life out of books and records, filling the gaps between words and notes. That is why I rush into our room to find you mumbling and moaning in your incoherent performance. That is why I rub and squeeze you and love to hear your live, alterable cry against my breast Lawson Fusao Inada

from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young

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Jazz Poems

THE JAZZ OF THIS HOTEL

Why do I curse the jazz of this hotel?

I like the slower tom-toms of the sea;

I like the slower tom-toms of the thunder;

I like the more deliberate dancing knee

Of outdoor love, of outdoor talk and wonder.

I like the slower, deeper violin

Of the wind across the fields of Indian corn;

I like the far more ancient violincello

Of whittling loafers telling stories mellow

Down at the village grocery in the sun;

I like the slower bells that ring for church

Across the Indiana landscape old.

Therefore I curse the jazz of this hotel

That seems so hot, but is so hard and cold

VACHEL LINDSAY

from Jazz Poems | Selected and edited by Kevin Young

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Jazz Poems

JAZZ FANTASIA

Drum on your drums, batter on your banjoes,

sob on the long cool winding saxophones

Go to it, O jazzmen.

Sling your knuckles on the bottoms of the happy

tin pans, let your trombones ooze, and go husha-

husha-hush with the slippery sand-paper.

Moan like an autumn wind high in the lonesome tree-

tops, moan soft like you wanted somebody terrible, cry

like a racing car slipping away from a motorcycle cop,

bang-bang! you jazzmen, bang altogether drums, traps,

banjoes, horns, tin cans-–make two people fight on the

top of a stairway and scratch each other’s eyes in a

clinch tumbling down the stairs.

Can the rough stuff… now a Mississippi steamboat

pushes up the night river with a hoo-hoo-hoo-oo… and

the green lanterns calling to the high soft stars… a red

moon rides on the humps of the low river hills… go to

it, O jazzmen.

CARL SANDBURG

from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young

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Jazz Poems

Jazz Band In A Parisian Cabaret

Play that thing,

Jazz band!

Play it for the lords and ladies,

For the dukes and counts,

For the whores and gigolos,

For the American millionaires,

And the school teachers

Out for a spree.

Play it,

Jazz band!

You know that tune

That laughs and cries at the same time.

You know it.

May I?

Mais oui.

Mein Gott!

Parece una rumba.

Play it, jazz band!

You’ve got seven languages to speak in

And then some,

Even if you do come from Georgia.

Can I go home wid yuh, sweetie?

Sure.

LANGSTON HUGHES 

from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young

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