Originally posted 4/6/2013.

Used to tell myself

stop listening to Max Roach,
stop reading Greg Corso;
you’ll never
have Max’s singing rhythm, 
never match Corso’s mad flow.

Today I say shut up,
stop yourself, self.

The joy of Max’s silky beat,
Corso’s rough banging, tongue hanging words —

good enough for me
without looking for more now,

for now I know who I am —

I write like a plowhorse plodding.
I never could figure one end of a drum stick from another.
Already in the “where are they now’ file.
Already deep in the winding down — 

I know who I am.

Hearing Max Roach without envy,
reading Greg Corso with no lust to best him?

All the ambition and strain has fallen
completely at last away. 

I’m not rattled
or on fire anymore.
I can finally hear
and be at peace.

Originally posted 2/23/2011.

Left the radio on
and fell asleep; 
woke before dawn
to Sonny Rollins.

So this is why
I corresponded all night
with herons!
I recall long letters
written in dark ink
on creamy paper
with quills lent to me
by green herons
and great blues.

No, that was
a dream, says the 
daylight — 

Sonny says,
who you gonna believe?
Sonny says

go back to sleep,
seek the herons’ counsel;
this argument will keep
as I play: first, a song to accompany
a deep wading into 
night’s marsh;

then, a song
to fly by.

Originally posted 10/5/2012.

Sylvester on the radio sings,

“…YOU MAKE ME FEEL MIGHTY REAL…”

Sylvester is dead. For real.
God only knows how real he now feels.

I am not dead
but I will be sooner rather
than later, 

for real. Getting comfortable with that
is my number one job these days;
I wish I was mighty ready 
to be alone in the night with it. 

When people danced to this
back in Old School
they often danced hand in hand
with Mighty Real Death;

it is in this way
that disco
is a form of blues.

Wish I was ready to dance naked and alone
in the kitchen RIGHT NOW,
but I am neither mighty enough
nor real enough yet,
so back to bed I go to write about realness,
like a damn fool — 

because this is not
how one should die,
flat on a fat ass,
on a bed,
banging a laptop.

“…YOU MAKE ME FEEL MIGHTY REAL…”

This will have to do
until the day when
I finally find myself
dancing into a mirror,
pointing at the sad sack
I’m dancing with, the dance partner
I’ve had all my life, the one 
pointing back at me from the mirror, 
each of us laughing this song
out of our terrified mouths 
as loudly as we can:

“…YOU MAKE ME FEEL…MIIIIGHTY REAL…”

and not stopping
until we fall.

Originally posted 12/17/2010.

From the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, Dec. 26th, 1895:

“William Lyons, 25, a levee hand, was shot in the abdomen yesterday evening at 10 o’clock in the saloon of Bill Curtis, at Eleventh and Morgan Streets, by Lee Sheldon, a carriage driver.

“Lyons and Sheldon were friends and were talking together. Both parties, it seems, had been drinking and were feeling in exuberant spirits. The discussion drifted to politics, and an argument was started, the conclusion of which was that Lyons snatched Sheldon’s hat from his head. The latter indignantly demanded its return.

“Lyons refused, and Sheldon withdrew his revolver and shot Lyons in the abdomen. When his victim fell to the floor Sheldon took his hat from the hand of the wounded man and coolly walked away….

“Lee Sheldon is also known as ‘Stag’ Lee.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1.

My childhood neighbor
was a fine painter
who painted nothing
but landscapes and barrooms.
In every landscape there was a stream,
in every barroom there was a hat,
in every painting there was a figure
with its back turned,
facing a corner
or a hanging tree.

One night he got drunk,
started screaming about the President,
and shot all his canvases
with a 12-gauge.

Somehow,
no cop gunned him down, 
and he was singing “Stagger Lee”
when they shoved him hard 
into the cruiser.

2.

On Christmas Night, 1895, in a St. Louis bar,
Billy Lyons and Stag Lee
were arguing over politics.
Billy fell gut shot by Stag,
eventually died, and
they put themselves on the hit parade
forever.

There was rumor back then that Stag
was a sheriff’s bastard son
and no one dared touch him.
It was a fact that he was a Black man
but a myth that he got away with murder —

he went to jail
but didn’t swing,
didn’t die for it before arrest,
or before a judge could have his say.

3.

The moon was yellow,
the leaves came tumbling down.

I remember hearing
my neighbor call out,
“Sheriff,
you son of a bitch,
keep your hands off
my damn hat,”

and thought I saw
a lean ghost in the shadows
making sure
the man was safe before
he coolly walked away
humming that sacred song.

Originally posted 10/4/2013.

A beautiful Saturday night in the city:

a punk fan
spits up on a classic rock fan
in front of a disco
and a country fan turns up her nose
at the hard, hard house music
her date seems to prefer.

A jazz fan hurries past everyone
because no one likes a jazz fan
except for the reggae fans — they
love everyone, mostly.  Mostly —

except for that guy
with “Tosca” leaking
from his earbuds.  

Meanwhile on the corner
two surprising kids
are committing a bluegrass murder,
hoping for spare change in the hat.

There’s a hint of bhangra in the air
and a hint of merengue in the air
and a hint of calypso and soca and mento
and someone’s got a ska torch lit too;

it’s a beautiful Saturday night
in the clamoring city,
making you wish
you could play everything
whenever you close your eyes.

Originally posted 2/7/2013.

I give a sorrow
opening.  I
loose it on
a gap within. Soon come

ornery, tantrum, layabout and cry.
Going to victim this whole long day:
grow kudzu, a funeral bouquet
for neverending grief show.

Still, I got rocker hips,
roller hips, jazz groin and jazz lips:,
joy ends up somewhere
when pushed from head and heart.

Still, I end up one sad grinder.  
End up bad into more bad sinking,
but still with one way
to set it off and hold it back — and so,

on to music. Still in the hole, I give
my dance, my bad, my deep
some resistance. Rhythm’s a big mole digging in 
under the roots, a charged up winner

rubbling the dark; my earthly body
quakes cracking in the light.  Whenever
I, frightened, shake fear, I gotta dance
my dance, my bad, my deep — 

it’s my gotta happen.