Tribute
SO I who have lost nothing
But my stylized tears
Found real Art, a Bird, some
Roach
And Diz
and dat bursting forth
In shimmering splendour
Voices of
wondrous gifts and tales.
In the question mark of
tenors
In the defiant thrust of the
trumpets
In the glass-enclosure of
tinkle-boom Bud
(Who chewed the ivory
changes to shreds
Then escaped, his madness
intact)
I found again arrival to
restful triumph.
Hot lips gave me the water
of welcome.
Everyday and everynight we jam
Till the blues turn green
Then ripen into a mellow
tone.
We gather with Prez, Beast and Bags
And shake hands with
shimmying Shepp,
There’s Pharaoh who came in
the last Trane
Cherry with his Fulani head,
Mal and soulful eyes
Fatha whose coast to coast grin
Holds a tempest in waiting
Mr. Davis who must live more
miles or die
Mr. Armstrong, the jester
who is nobody’s fool
Bessie and Billie and Nina
and Miriam
We know the way home, that
the Congo
will be O.K.
And we know too the sound
reasons why.
Monk’s Tale
HE PLAYED just enough to
weigh
The measured tale his faith fulway
From the solid steam
He dissolved it all into
brilliancies
That tasked the false
brotherhood
Of black and white keys
And nailed each note home
In the name of justice
He named it as it fell
In fellowship first of all
And in fairness most of all,
His melodious Thunk
As he saw it as he called it
Thus he could shuffle, boil
And dance even in America
My fetish for voices
I TOOK silver, the colour of queen mothers
But the king-maker laughed
in my face
Fathers, they said, do not
see any difference
To the moon all her
daughters look alike
They have the same wonder,
ponder the same glitter,
Blood, they whispered
gently, has no memory at all
So go on, go on, they pushed
Why Cape
Coast, then? I asked.
Ah, they answered, their
faces dark as old gold:
It is a puzzle still, the
one-way streets
The wattle huts, the goats
and cats
The dogs that warm their
bellies on tarred roads
Waiting
with drawn tongues for the flies to settle.
But, I pleaded, are there
No feelings in common
No far-away voices
Only old habits
And this
store of tit-bits?
For that, answered the
palest of the gods
Take silver, the colour of royalty,
And go to the castle;
Find your children in
mourning motifs
And in gods carved fondly
for the tourist trade
Listen for them in the throb
of your running heart
The dust at your feet, the
liana vines
The voices that draw us to
the light:
Do you not know the worlds ends here
Right here, nowhere else but
the sea?
Dancing with Dizzy or Manteca, by Mr. Birks
THESE DANCERS ARE NOT used
to waiting for the beat
The music slides hot finders
under their skin
And they step with the
frenzy
The beat shakes them
The voice comes, collecting
their wishes
And teaches them to rise saying:
This is not the time to
surrender.
The singer leans her voice
against his windpipe
Against pain not finished
with us
His words cast shadows on
the happy beat
He steps all over the chorus
And swallows a stanza in
double time
And the dancers shake every
step with glee
Men and women startled by
their own bodies
These are songs to bring
sight to the night
Make us understand night’s
necessity
Why nights are holy and full
of flair
Even the blackest of all
possibility
The night held quiet in one
glass of beer;
There is heaven heaving to
be born
Songs to command it march
forth
Gurgling like a last gasp
Songs to molest the dancing
dead
Twinges and trills bent raw
invading softness
And the trumpet crowds the
floor
Slashes back and forth
counting our loss
His cheeks in a dizzy bulge
He blows, clutching fire in
his teeth
His faith is fluid and off
known keys
Diz diz diz
and dat. . .
Between tunes silence enough
To waken a sleeping river
And command it march forth
Singing
like the flood.