Jazz Poems
THE SYNCOPATED CAKEWALK
My present life is a Sunday morning cartoonIn it, I see Miss Hand and her Five Daughters
rubbing myback and the backs of my legs
Nat King Cole provides the music and the words
It’s 1949, Finished with them, I take off
on a river boat, down the Mississippi, looking for work.
On deck the got the Original Dixieland Jazz Band
doing “Big Butter and Egg Man.”
A guru haas the cabin next to mine and everybody
who visits him whimpers something terrible!
Stood on deck after dinner watching the clouds
form faces and arms. The Shadow went
by giggling to himself.
An Illinois Central ticket fell from his pocket.
Snake Hips picked it up, ran.
Texas Shuffle, who sat in with the Band last night,
this morning, dropped his fiddlecases
in the ocean and did the Lindy all the way
to the dinning room
I got off at Freak Lips Harbor.
Boy from Springfield said he’d talk like Satch for me
for a dime. I gave him a Bird,
and an introductory note to the Duke of Ellington.
Found my way to the Ida B. Wells Youth Center.
Girl named Ella said I’d have to wait to see Mister B.
Everybody else was out to lunch.
In the waiting room got into a conversation
with a horse thief from Jump Back. Told him:
My past life is a Saturday morning cartoon.
In it, I’m jumping Rock Island freight cars, skipping
Peoria with Leadbelly; running from the man,
trying to prove my innocence. Accused of being
too complex to handle.
Meanwhile, Zoot, Sassy, Getz, Prez, Cootie, everybody
gives me a hand.
Finally, Mister B comes in. Asks about my future.
All I can say is, I can do the Cow Cow Boogie
on the ocean and hold my own in a chase chorus
among the best!Fine, says Mister B, you start seven in the morning!
CLARENCE MAJOR
from Jazz Poems ~ Selected and Edited by Kevin Young
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