Black Coffee: Ella Fitzgerald and Miles Davis Inspired Musings
A Free Verse Musing On Jazz
Langston Hughes jazz poems this is not! This free verse musing comes from my 1920s fascination and disconnect from the present. Jazz poetry by definition "demonstrates jazz-like rhythm or the feel of improvisation". This one is a little more fluid, but definitely improvised! How to write jazz poetry? It comes from the soul. Not the heart. The heart may help out a bit, but it's the soul where the real stuff comes from.
Black Coffee
On a lonesome December night
With January close behind
I entered into a smoke filled room
With a red tint
While a dead trumpet player
Serenaded wine, women and dogs.
Coffee was black as night.
Smoke was hard
And the music seemed to echo through me
As if my soul was a canyon
Cut deep and rigid.
It appeared that the river
Coursing through this canyon
Was as strong and as dark as the coffee before me.
So into my cup I poured the cream
From a woman's breast.
The herbs and seasons of the Earth.
Sugar from the sweetest cane
And even flavors untouched by the maker Himself...
These flavors of apple spice and fig.
And then I drank.
I drank and I smoked to my hearts black content
And the music played on
And on I went.
The spice of the apple.
The sweetness of the fig.
The cool warmth of her milk
And the dew from her lips
Dripping down to her breast in a cascade of silk
Brings my drink to a wonderful flavor!
Yet...
This coffee is still dark...
As Caine himself.
Black Coffee Ella Style
What do you think?
This Poem is About...
Others Musings
- Kind of Blue - My time with Miles Davis and Other Reflections on Jazz
- Stolen Moments: A Tribute
In the late 80's and early 90's I learned about Jazz. I found it on my own, but my teacher was one man on Saturday and Sunday afternoons. The man was Simon Barley. The radio show was from 89.1 KUOR in... - A Brief Guide to Jazz Poetry- Poets.org - Poetry, Poems, Bios & More
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