A Collection of Jazz Poetry — Winter, 2021 Edition

Thank you Joe Maita for publishing “Don’t Ask this of Me” and “Passage Dreaming” in the Winter 2021 collection of jazz poems. These two pieces are in the company of some exceptional writing. Jazz aficionados will want to check out the Jerry Jazz Musician website for jazz photography, interviews, poetry and more.

DON’T ASK THIS OF ME

Coltrane stains the air
with dusky shadows
quivering across the bay
like words lost
between tenor-
haunted notes.

The waning moon sheds
a string of luminescent
pearls across dark water
each wavelet a silken shiver.

Burnished shiraz lingers on lips
bay-water laps ankles
voices hum with pining
under the sax’s spell.

Sound spills

                     on waves

                                     of breath.

Thoughts unravel
seeking
deep within cascading notes
          their flight?
               their poetry?

A fish breaches
its rupture creating circles
ever-widening
dives into hidden depths.

***

PASSAGE DREAMING

Rain cleanses city
     veils sky
softens colour
     sound.

Musical strains
     lift
praise through grey
     dawn.

Piano and tenor sax
     slip
into harp and flute
vibrate
with creation
                      chaos
light as a feather
                           falling
through time

notes
collect and break
apart

travel like a seeker’s
                                  heart
along a helix
                      of blue

spiral
          cascade
slip
       through clouds
                                like rain.

“DON’T ASK THIS OF ME” is a tribute to John Coltrane (1926-1967): jazz saxophonist and composer; renowned for experimental music and for introducing a movement toward spiritual transcendence in jazz.

“PASSAGE DREAMING” was inspired by the music of Alice Coltrane, also known as Turiyasangitananda.

I’d love to hear from you, K.