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Well, actually, I don't consider myself a jazz legend or anything.

quote by Joseph Jarman
Added by Lucian Velea
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Im A Legend Tonight

Ive been working at my job, slaving like a dog all day
And Ive been thinking about you, girl
And watching the minutes slip away
Yeah, and I know theres someone inside me that nobody sees
And I know in the darkness youre gonna be reaching for me
Im a legend tonight
Gonna make you feel right
When you reach for the light
Im a legend tonight
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight
You know they try to slow me, sometimes I think Im gonna stop
But I gotta keep on going, believing in 5 o clock, yeah
And on the edge of the darkness well be living in another world
And I know that a part of yous gonna be part of me, girl
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight
Look at me
I dont know what happens when the race is run
I dont know what tells me if Ive lost or won
But I know that Ill make it through the day alright
And girl, youre gonna find out
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend
Gonna make you feel right, legend
When you reach for the light, legend
Im a legend tonight, legend

song performed by Kiss
Added by Lucian Velea
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The Blues, The Jazz, The City

The city is jazz under neon lights
The jazz is blues stoned
And the city never forgets this
Like the heart never forgets to pulse
And the stars never forget to shine in the night
But it takes jazz to move it, to move it all
So the jazz is the beat that always burns
So the heavens continue to shine on and shine all

The jazz soothes the souls of the children
Though the city is old, the jazz is young
Thus the jazz, fast and heavy, radiates the city
She returns her to her ember glow in night

The city is high on the hill and low in the valley
She is the heart, the blessed nectar, the blossom shower
The jazz glows in prosperous tombs
She serves the crashing wave of the monsoon, to the city's bay, to the ancient harbor, across bold rivers, to lakes nestled in the safety of moors and battlefields, and sings to the forest and soaks the timber and every reborn city is cloaked in the fingertip of jazz
Since jazz destroys and creates, it is the fire, and so the smoke rises higher
Hark the newborn guff of jazz
The baptized funeral pyre

Hench jazz is the gospel, the good news
She returns though, always to the blues
Love the blue lady, her old cracked voice
The blues, the jazz, and the lady unite
To the bravery of her song she sang to the evil eyes of the Kodak dragon whose hair in the hiding bear under masks of hatred
The jealous lair, the haunt of despair
And jazz shines on, they can't stop her
The lady of the city sings to the farm
No choir can match the timbre of the lady
My first love,
She shines on for me when I am sad, through me in melancholy
And we join in joy, the lady sees all, feels all, and sings on
Rambunctious be the lady, the city, the blues
Who beat for hearts at night

From the slide trombone, the tut-tut-tut of the mighty snare
The brass milieu for brighter days and neon lights
The whimper
The whimper of the stand-up bass, who carries the beat, the jazz, the blues, the night
In your arms I am safe and sound, the sounds who hold me tight
And above all, upon the highest peak, the great black giants, the black hands and breath of jazz, food for the soul and fodder, who inspire all in the world
But the two giants upon the highest mountain compete for the night and walk away friends as we do
They too are the shine, the noble sheen, and while the lady sings, they dance, the boozers hound and prance, the lovers kneel and romance and the giants push the pebbles from beneath their mountain feet

Who knows how many souls the jazz saved, but I know she saved mine
The giants, trumpet and sax, and even the sweet other of New Orleans, a trumpet and voice, a demigod, and every other band and face and time
So the jazz soothed them too to be saved, as they played, we all played, and jazz shines for the night
And Jack drew the map in sketches, he saw the jazz, but the jazz sees all, and saves all who smile upon her because she loves all, but can only save those who hear her call because she is human

[...] Read more

poem by Jay Bradley
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What Becomes A Legend Most

What becomes a legend most
When shes alone in a hotel lobby
What becomes a legend most
Some bad champagne and some foreign bottled beer
What becomes a legend most
When the musicians have come and then leave her
What becomes a legend most
Besides being a legendary star
What becomes a legend most
Lying in bed cold and regal
What becomes a legend most
Lying in bed watching a talk show on tv
What becomes a legend most
Fifty days in fifty cities
And everyone says she looks pretty
At least as pretty as a legend should
Fifty days can wear you down
Fifty cities flying by
A different man in each different hotel
And if youre not careful, word can get around
What becomes a legend most
Not a bed, that is half empty
Not a heart, that is left empty
Thats not pretty, not pretty at all
What becomes a legend most
When shes lying in her hotel room
What becomes a legend most
Well baby, tonight its you (tonight its you)
Baby, tonight its you
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la) baby, its you
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la) maybe tomorrow
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la) baby, its you
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la)
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la)
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la)
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la)
(what becomes a legend most, sha-la-la-la-la)

song performed by Lou Reed
Added by Lucian Velea
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Some Considerations

Consider this world and also our place in it
and know that time passes by every minute.
Consider those who’re living and also the dead
and know of the ways people earn their bread.
We consider many things but few are of real importance
and know that all those which are not are in abundance.

In consideration of this what can anyone do?
but live one’s life in a way which is true.

Consider the flowers in the garden and the colours they show
and know that with tender loving care from a seed they grow.
Consider all the children somewhere and watch them play
and know that with laughter and fun most pass the day.
Consider the things which are false and those which are true
and know how each one can and does affect all that we do.

In consideration of this what can we all do?
but try and live in a way which is just true.

Consider the march of the spirit of progress and the direction we’re all going
and know that every so often we must turn around and look back knowing.
Consider that which we all know and also that which we do not
and know it’s but knowledge and ignorance that make up the lot.
Consider the beginning and that of the very end
and know it’s terrible to get there without a friend.

In consideration of this what can one do?
but go through life with a friend who’s true.

Consider about each day and then also about each night
and know that without them there’s no darkness or light.
Consider the sunshine and also the shade
and know that with them each day is made.
Consider the evening and also the time we sleep
and know that because of them the night is deep.

In consideration of this what is there to do?
but live one day at a time and remember too.

Consider that which seems right and also what appears wrong
and know that they are both attributes of the weak and strong.
Consider the past and the future and of course the present
and know that all life relates to them and is not an accident.
Consider the labour with the crops and also the extent of the field
and know that with care and nature’s help a rich harvest will yield.

In consideration of this what is there one must do?
but only the best that one can so as to get through.

[...] Read more

poem by George Krokos
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JAZZ and RAINBOWS

What is Jazz - What is a Rainbow?
You can ask the questions - don't expect answers

Jazz is free and yet constrained
Rainbows come and go as they please

Jazz is wild and yet restrained
Rainbow can't exist without rain

Jazz is open and yet contained
Rainbows always have red at the top

Jazz is unscored and yet maintained
Rainbows can be single - double - triple

Just as Jango Rheinhardt said to Segovia
Senor it ees all in ze 'ed
The same is true of rainbows
Zey are all inside my 'ed!

It takes all the colours of pure white sound
To create jazz.
It takes all the colours of pure white light
To create a rainbow.

Jazz and rainbows operate on the same principle
In jazz the tone colours are separated by the players
In a rainbow the visible colours are separated by a raindrop
Jazz and rainbows are boh equally beautiful.

After the rain there are stll some drops in the atmosphere
They refract the white light into R O Y G B I V,
In the same way the 'Jazz Combo' is able to dissect.
The white sound of music is disected by the musicains

On a sunny day - the white light hits the raindrop
The colours are dispersed forming the rainbow.
In jazz - each member if the Combo has a colour!
The double bass has red - the saxaphone is orange!

The percussion is yellow - the brass is green
The clarinet is blue - trhe banjo is indigo
The guitar is violet and the piano is striped!
The combo plays and whiite sound is re-produced.

Because we are humans our senses of life are acute.
Our eyes for colour and our ears for sound.
The quality of this provision enables us to distinguish colour
And to distinguish between all the tones and semi-tones.

[...] Read more

poem by John Knight
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Victor Should Have Been A Jazz Musician

I went to a concert, to see nina, simone,
The concert was over, there was still a band playing, the rap up,
The booguh played with his hands, I close my eyes, and look at him,
Victor should have been a jazz musician,
I said to myself, victor should have been a jazz musician,
I looked at his face, and I saw victor, looked at his smile, and I saw victor,
I looked at his hair, and thought,
Victor should have been a jazz musician,
Victor should have been a jazz musician,
And the people dancing on the floor, dancing on the floor, were so high,
You should have seen victor smile, you should have seen victor smile,
As they danced all the while all around on the floor, and he laughed,
Victor should have been a jazz musician,
Oh, victor should have been a jazz musician,
He was playing so nice, the jazz musician,
Ah, ah,
Hes living in a fast beat, in a city thats hot,
Telling all the latinos and puerto ricans, victor seems happy, but he doesnt even know himself, hes gotta look inside to know his first love,
Victor was a jazz musician, he was playing so nice, victor was a jazz musician, (? ) victor was a jazz musician,
Victor loves his music, he loves his music, somewhere, he plays his music, somewhere,
Victor is a jazz musician,
Jazz.

song performed by Grace Jones
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Death Drugs

Long live the legend.
Long live the legend.
Long live the legend.
Itll out live us.
Aw mom, I need some long sleeved shirts.
You got to get me some long sleeved shirts.
Mom mom, I need some long sleeved shirts.
You gotta hide the marks where I stick the works.
The things we were doing got me under the rugs.
Were doin the death drugs.
How come bobby dilan and louie reed
Theyre never seen in short sleeves.
Hey the sixties everybodys going to heaven.
Sixty-nine, sixty-eight, sixty-seven.
The things we were doing got me under the rugs.
We be doing the death drugs.
Long live the legend.
Its not for everyone.
Long live the legend.
Its not for everyone.
Long live the legend.
Its not for everyone.
Long live the legend.
Its not for everyone.
Long live the legend.
Long live the legend.
Long live the legend.
Itll out live us.
Gordon gano: vocals, guitar
Brian ritchie: acoustic bass guitar, vocals
Guy hoffman: drums, vocals
Produced by brian ritchie and gordon gano
Recorded and mixed by david vartanian at dvs perversion room, milwaukee, wi
gorno music reprinted with permission

song performed by Violent Femmes
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House Of Jazz

Humdinger
Bell ringer
Got a nasty stinger
To slow you down
Mud slinger
Gold digger
Who point the finger
And do you down
Kickin' and a fightin' on a TV show
Lightin' blindin' in the middle of the road
Are you comin' in
Are you comin' in

I said come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz

Ball stripper
Big tipper
Got a slap 'n' tickler
To make you growl
Spitin' and bitin' on a TV show
Tightenin' frightenin' givin' out a load
Are you comin' in
Are you comin' in

I said come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz

Are you comin' in
Come on in

Are you comin' in
Are you comin' in
I said come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Are you comin' in
Are you comin' in
I said into the house of jazz

[...] Read more

song performed by AC/DC from Stiff Upper Lip
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House Of Jazz

(young - young)
Humdinger
Bell ringer
Got a nasty stinger
To slow you down
Mud slinger
Gold digger
Who point the finger
And do you down
Kickin and a fightin on a tv show
Lightin blindin in the middle of the road
Are you comin in
Are you comin in
I said come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz, yes
Ball stripper
Big tipper
Got a slap n tickler
To make you growl
A spitin and bitin on a tv show
Tightenin frightenin givin out a load
Are you comin in
Are you comin in
I said come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Are you comin in
Come on in
Are you comin in
Are you comin in
I said come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
Are you comin in
Are you comin in
I said into the house of jazz
Come into the house of
Come into the house of
Come into the house of jazz
The house of jazz

[...] Read more

song performed by AC-DC
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Enter Jazz

In the past few weeks
(1995, I think)
A whole field of music
Has knocked on my door.
Jazz has made my acquaintance.
Jazz who has always before
Seemed so stale, so staid,
So stuck in a groove
Sometime back in the thirties,
Jazz now emerges
As the most delightful companion.

I first noticed
My new friend
On the Voice of America,
A sudden lightness of spirit
Lighting up my room
Through the transistor radio.

Then Nancy, Carolyn's mum in Ferny Creek,
Turned out to be a jazz fan
With a collection of cassettes,
And I abandoned myself
To jazz's invitation
To dance,
Easy, free-flowing steps
Up and down
The lounge-room carpet.

Last night
The friendship firmed further:
In the E.G. Guide
Was listed a jazz trio
Which they claimed could be heard
At the Albert Park Hotel
Not far away.
The trio swelled to seven or eight musicians
As the evening unfolded
And I drank in the rhythms
Of what a chat with their apparent leader, Bill,
Revealed was traditional jazz
In the Chicago style,
So sweet, so gentle, so softly swinging.
Jazz took my arm
And smiled.

I have a new friend.

poem by Peter Elliott
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The History of Jazz

I

The leaves of blue came drifting down.
In the corner Madeleine Reierbacher was reading Lorna Doone.
The bay’s water helped to implement the structuring of the garden hose.
The envelope fell. Was it pink or was it red? Consult Lorna Doone.
There, voyager, you will find your answer. The savant grapeade stands
Remember Madeleine Reierbacher. Madeleine Reierbacher says,
“If you are happy, there is no one to keep you from being happy;
Don’t let them!” Madeleine Reierbacher went into the racing car.
The racing car was orange and red. Madeleine Reierbacher drove to Beale Street.
There Maddy doffed her garments to get into some more comfortable clothes.
Jazz was already playing in Beale Street when Madeleine Reierbacher arrived there.
Madeleine Reierbacher picked up the yellow horn and began to play.
No one had ever heard anything comparable to the playing of Madeleine Reierbacher.
What a jazz musician! The pianist missed his beats because he was so excited.
The drummer stared out the window in ecstasy at the yellow wooden trees.
The orchestra played “September in the Rain,” “Mugging,” and “I’m Full of Love.”
Madeleine Reierbacher rolled up her sleeves; she picked up her horn; she played “Blues in the Rain.”
It was the best jazz anyone had ever heard. It was mentioned in the newspapers. St. Louis!
Madeleine Reierbacher became a celebrity. She played with Pesky Summerton and Muggsy Pierce.
Madeleine cut numerous disks. Her best waxings are “Alpha Beta and Gamma”
And “Wing Song.” One day Madeleine was riding on a donkey
When she came to a yellow light; the yellow light did not change.
Madeleine kept hoping it would change to green or red. She said, “As long as you have confidence,
You need be afraid of nothing.” Madeleine saw the red smokestacks, she looked at the thin trees,
And she regarded the railroad tracks. The yellow light was unchanging. Madeleine’s donkey dropped dead
From his mortal load. Madeleine Reierbacher, when she fell to earth,
Picked up a blade of grass and began to play. “The Blues!” cried the workmen of the vicinity,
And they ran and came in great numbers to where Madeleine Reierbacher was.
They saw her standing in that simple field beside the railroad track
Playing, and they saw that light changing to green and red, and they saw that donkey stand up
And rise into the sky; and Madeleine Reierbacher was like a clot of blue
In the midst of the blue of all that sky, and the young farmers screamed
In excitement, and the workmen dropped their heavy boards and stones in their excitement,
And they cried, “O Madeleine Reierbacher, play us the ‘Lead Flint Blues’ once again!”

O railroad stations, pennants, evenings, and lumberyards!
When will you ever bring us such a beautiful soloist again?
An argent strain shows on the reddish face of the sun.
Madeleine Reierbacher stands up and screams, “I am getting wet! You are all egotists!”
Her brain floats up into the lyric atmosphere of the sky.
We must figure out a way to keep our best musicians with us.
The finest we have always melt in the light blue sky!
In the middle of a concert, sometimes, they disappear, like anvils.
(The music comes down to us with sweet white hands on our shoulders.)
We stare up in surprise; and we hear Madeleine’s best-known tune once again,
“If you ain’t afraid of life, life can’t be afraid for you.”
Madeleine! Come back and sing to us!

[...] Read more

poem by Kenneth Koch
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An Abc Of Inner Peace

inner peace: a to z (© Raj Arumugam, September 2008)

Inner peace is effortless, as it’s always there within.
One just has to see it.

And once one truly sees this inner peace – not with words or just
intellectually, but actually see this inner peace within – it is one’s, always;
no one takes away that…

Nothing and no evil and no violent force or even the most difficult
of circumstances in one’s life can remove that inner peace that one
sees within; but let one see this not as a word, or as a phrase
but as an actuality.

Feel that peace, see that inner peace and let it radiate always – for it is
the harmony within each and it is always one’s own.

A


Let amity be your constant companion….Be at peace with all beings, equally at peace with those near and those far, and thus walk hand in hand with amity as in a bounteous garden…





B


Be mindful of your blessings always…To be alive, to breathe in fresh air;
and to be with the family and the companionship of good fellow-human
beings; and the kindness of strangers; and the creatures of this world
and the flowers that bloom, and to have a place in this marvelous planet
of ours….all these too are blessings….

There is a life of the body in the domain of the physical, and
the legitimate needs of the body are just as important as
one’s inner needs…

[...] Read more

poem by Raj Arumugam
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Consider It Done

Consider it done.
Done.
Done.
Done.
Consider it done.
Done.
Done.
Done.
Consider it done.
Done.
Done.
Done.
Consider it done.
Consider it done.

Getting near a fiscal cliff,
And knowing of it.
But...
ignoring all the warnings,
Or it there to exist...
To feed an addiction to greed,
Regardless of the risks.

Well...
Consider it done.
Your feeding.
Done.
And with a greeding.
Done.

Consider it done.
Done.
Done.
Done.
Consider it done.
The feast.
Consider it done.
That feast depleted,
With a wish for more to eat...
Is done!

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Reverse Reality

when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision
when one becomes somebody, it is actually nobody
when one happens naturally to be nobody, it is a real somebody by decision

poem by Nyein Way
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Courtney Pine

Listen to me now,
For there is a sound of music flowing in the air;
Listen to me now,
For the melody of a realm is about to touch you and teach you;
And, to 'Courtney Pine' i do pay my respect.
Listen to me now,
For the message will infuse your brains with Jazz! !
And, to 'Courtney Pine' i do give my respect;
However, it is very important to listen to the words of our elders.

The Jazz music of 'Courtney Pine',
it is very important to learn from him as well;
So, listen to the sweet music of Jazz that he plays!
For the melody of this realm is about to touch you and teach you.
to the muse of music,
From the lessons he learnt from 'Mac Tontoh';
And to swing up with his mind so sweet! !
From the Jazz world of love and to the Jazz world of peace,
But, you've got to be somebody for someone on this earth.

Hope is a beautiful mind in your heart's desires,
But you are of the courteous order of the realms!
And, you are unifying us with your Jazz Music;
For, you're paired in nature's endeavours.

'Courtney Pine',
Nurturing everybody with the 'Order of the British Empire' (O.B.E.) !
But, you are placed in nature's endeavours to educate the youth;
And like the muse of your love when you paid Ghana a visit.

poem by Edward Kofi Louis
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Intro-the Legend Of Norman Paperman/kinja

By jimmy buffett, 1996
Jimmy buffett explores new creative ground here, putting the two-hundred year history of amerigo, a fictitious caribbean island, into a calypso number, and framing it into another song, the lege
Norman paperman, the theme of the show. the principal singer is the governor of the island, and the key characters of the show sing verses about the history.
Narrator
Kinja was the name of the island when it was british. the actual name was king george the third island, but the islanders shortened that to kinja. now the name in the maps and the guidebooks is
Go, but everybody who still lives there still calls it kinja. the united states acquired the island peaceably in 1940 as part of the shuffling of old destroyers and caribbean real estate that we
Between mr. roosevelt and mr. churchill. the details of the transaction were and are vague to the inhabitants. the west indian is not exactly hostile to change, but hes not much inclined to be
In it. meantime in a fashion amerigo is getting americanized. the inflow of cash is making everyone more prosperous. most kinjans go along cheerily with this explosion of american energy in the
Bbean. to them it seems like a new harmless and apparently endless carnival.
Sanders
Have you ever dreamed of escaping from your dull existence to a new life on a tropical island? our story is about a man who did it - a real person, whose true adventure has become a legend here
E caribbean. welcome one and all to the legend of norman paperman.
Ensemble
Dis is the legend of norman papuhman
Tale from the islands well share
Chasin illusions can get quite confusin
Is it a dream or a nightmare
Women
Dis is the legend of norman papuhman
Tale from the islands well tell
Men
Chasin illusions can get quite confusin
Cause heaven can turn into hell.
Sanders [sings]
Kinjas the name of the island
Its been kinja for over two hundred years
But remember paradise
Doesnt come without a price
Let me make that abundantly clear
Kinja, our beautiful island
In a windward archipeligo
Weve been english, french and dutch
Never seemed to matter much
Now were officially amerigo
Ensemble
Were kinja
Still kinja
Our kinja
Sanders
(sheila, chef at the gull reef club)
Sheila
Our ancestors came in the slave ships
To work for the privileged few
Who wore paris fashions
And lived in pink mansions
While we huddled in shacks of bamboo
Den da sugar beet bring us our freedom
With the help of our God we got through
Insurrection, beheadins, funerals and weddins
Hurricanes and a world war or two

[...] Read more

song performed by Jimmy Buffett
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Consider Me Gone - Reba McEntire

Verse: 1
Every time I turn the conversation
To something deeper
Than the weather,
I can feel you always shuttin' down,
And when I need an explanation
For the silence, you just tell me
You don't wanna
Talk about it now.

Bridge: 1
What you're not saying is coming in loud and clear.
We're at a crossroads here...

Chorus:
If I'm not the one thing you can't stand to lose,
If I'm not that arrow to the heart of you,
If you don't get drunk on my kiss,
If you think you can do better than this,
Then I guess we're done.
Let's not drag this on.
Consider me gone.

Verse 2:
With you I've always been wide open,
Like a window or an ocean,
There is nothing
I've ever tried to hide.
So when you leave me not knowin'
Where you're goin',
I start thinkin' that we're lookin',
We're lookin' at goodbye.

Bridge 2:
How about a strong shot of honesty.
Don't you owe that to me...

(chorus)
Consider me a memory.
Consider me the past.
Consider me a smile in an old photograph,
Someone who used to make you laugh.

If I'm not the one thing you can't stand to lose,
If I'm not that arrow to the heart of you,
Then I guess we're done,
Let's not drag this on.
Consider me gone.
Consider me gone.
Consider me gone.

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poem by Rebecca Ryan
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Ellamental

Way back, take a look, she would cook
When they were stompin at the savoy
She would blow, and they would dance, dont you know ?
It was an uptown kind a show
Cool notes and melodies, harmonies
She sang the song of the universe
She can make a joyful noise up to heaven
And call the angels down to the earth
From jazz, to swing, to be-bop
She kept the spirit alive
For bo, duke, dizzy, and miles
She spoke her mind
Shes ellamental to the art
She spoke her mind
Shes ellamental to the art
Too hot, until the dawn she sang on
When joints were jumpin and jive was in
Bodies movin back and forth to the rhythm
Ever since ella first did her thing
From jazz, to swing to be-bop
She brought emotions and moves
She kept the spirit alive.
She spoke her mind
Act like ya know, oh!
Was it the smooth tones that was so much like butter
Oh ella was singin just like no other singer
Cause you know I be the funky bringer of the new style
Because I be the wild child.
Listenin to hip-hop, listening to be-bop and jazz
Ella made you move that ass
Sensation for the people, insperation for the sisters and brothers
Smooth jazz for the midnight lovers
Savoy was the spot for shakin on your rump and
Ella made it hoppin
Got the joint jumpin, remembering you til the dawn
Because ella your memory goes on
She spoke her mind (yeah...and it just dont stop)
Shes ellamental to the art (the memory goes on and on...cause it just dont stop)
She spoke her mind (...yeah..jazz to the bebop)
Shes ellamental to the art
She spoke her mind..(yeah...much love...)
She spoke her mind...

song performed by Vanessa Williams
Added by Lucian Velea
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Now, Heart' - Some Of What I Remember When I Listen

A river is a process through time, and the river stages are its momentary parts.
—Willard Van Orman Quine

From early poems,1970s, youthful indiscretions/attempts to vocally/poetically arrive at/derive a worthwhile writer's voice. Some explication might serve or enhance these under serving, undeserving though 'striving-after' poems hidden in old journals understandably unpublished but now so with apologies which are these expiatory explanations. Recently rediscovering these early arrivals, derivative yet aspiring I recognized and reembraced an enduring self maturing, arriving into late middle age:

Obsessed newly by jazz, mad about the many miraculous lady singers, entranced all too easily as youth are wont to be by sorrows and sexual infatuations which feel, emphasis on 'feel', like love, here are two of many 'songs' as tributes and life markers to jazz singers who provided soundtrack and felt expression to my angst and easily inflated/deflated sense of self, of beloved others, and of that new territory, independent life away from parental home and childhood community discovering, blundering into the fray of separate hearts and minds, irresponsible genitals and insouciant jouissance ('juiciness', in French) , discovering then and again and again that like Walt Whitman I 'contain worlds' and many disparate selves poorly formed, most of them collective projections and expectations of who or what I wanted to be, what others wanted and expected me to be, resulting in much confusion, tumult and multitudes of momentary throw-away selves. Thus singers like Bessie Smith and Dinah Washington became anchors, warm contexts and containers, for my daily fragmentation and re-formation.

I lived on 3rd street in downtown Chattanooga, a refugee from zealous, politically conservative white evangelicals and the vestigial yet still viral Southern Confederacy. Just a block or two from where Bessie Smith was born, I used to watch from my upstairs porch the steep hilly street's comings and goings with a glimpse of the Tennessee River between tenements across the street, its persistent rich aroma heavy in the air. I imagined Bessie Smith as a little girl playing up and down the street like the kids I saw then - once, two of them gleefully chasing a frighteningly large and confused looking rat.

William—he insisted on 'Willie'—an old man down the street who knew Bessie as a little girl, used to come up to my porch after one day hearing Bessie from my phonograph singing blues onto the always busy but attentive street. One of the first and permanent things I learned from my porch is that a city street has keen, observant eyes, acute ears, omnivorously seeing/hearing everything, indifferently, perhaps, but nothing escapes it, a roving, all-knowing urban Eye of God.

Extremely green and eager as green always is though stutteringly, and without apology, I enjoyed Willie's many stories and back pocket bottles of Old Mr. Boston Apricot Brandy, both of which—story and spirits/spirited story —dissolved or appeared to, age, racial, cultural, and sociological differences, along with those catalysts/cata-lusts, the forever alchemical Bessie and other jazz singers, Billie! Dinah! Ella! Sassy! Lil Ester Phillips! Nina Simone! to name only a few of the sensuous solutio chanteuses resolving sexual confoundaries by Miss-ambiguating sins' plethera with loose lilt and will- o-the-lisp whisper tongues.

One night Willie, much 'in the pocket'—an expression for being well onto tipsy which I've never heard from anyone but him—wanted to dance to a Bessie tune playing, 'Back Water Blues', him recalling nights as a young man in rural Tennessee where he'd worked hard days in oppressive vegetable fields then hit the after hours juke joints for 'colored, twas segregation days, ' he explained, where he would go to drink, dance then dive/delve, as it were, into the sensual mysteries of moist skin, hot breath, mutually open mouths with their commodious moans and mumbles, venial hands, always vital parts, private hearts mutually pounding ancient known rhythms, odors and tastes of gin and those slender, forbidden, now greedily stolen bites in those all too short nights with their damned intrusive dawns.

'Dawnus interuptus, ' I quipped, us both slapping knees, passing the narrative bottle fore and aft hefting moments re-grasped between us, offerings to the equally narrative river, the all-knowing hungry street.

Jumping to his feet, Willie described 'powder dancin'' (pronounced marvelously, 'powdah') which I had never heard of. Talcum powder would be copiously scattered onto the dance floor where couples in stocking or bare feet would ecstatically dance, gliding and sliding sweetly scented, muskily bent toward later glides and slides in the slippery joy of momentary allure and amour on dimmed porches or surrounding woods often enough and gratis upon delicate slabs of moonlight gratuitously dewy providing cushion for Passion's out and in, honoring and dignifying deities of skin wanting more making more skin, headlong Nature's frictional algo-rhythms indelibly scored in every/each his/her yawing yen.

Willie shouted, 'YOU GOT ANY TALC POWDER? ! '

...The jazz us trembled...

'NO! ' I bellowed, curious.

'YOU GOT ANY FLOUR? ! '

Even more curious, 'YEAH! ! '

'GO GIT IT! QUICK! ! '

He grinned an Old Mr. Boston juke-joint night-memories quaff-again grin.

Martha White, a brand of flour sold down South, has never been put to better use. Willie threw handfuls of 'Martha' over the tenement-planked living room floor as I half protested at the mess it (and me and Willie) was and would become. Completely gripped by his present-in-the-past brandy trance, a much younger man now, he suddenly grabbed me, brandied and tranced, too, my long hair flying, and danced me all over the floor the night through with swigs of Old But Now Spry 'n' Sprightly Mr. Boston with pauses to change record albums on the phonograph, 'catching up our breaths, ' he panted.

Next morning (more likely early afternoon) , Willie long gone, I awakened sprawled on the penitent porch—a cool concrete floor my sinner's bench—sweaty and thick as pan gravy, mosquito bitten, marinaded in Tennessee night mists. I staggered into the living room onto the ghostly floor powdery white, 'stroked' with two attached, or close to, sets of foot prints, heel slides and smears, a kind of 'Jackson Pollock meets Tibetan sand painting 'yazzed' yantra'**' with cigarette ashes flicked into the flickering impermanent mix. I've not powder danced since when we drank discovering oral history's joys, opened eager ears and fraternal arms forgetting fears of race and religion, age and expressed/ espressed Desire's multilingual disseminations.

I know that wheat is anciently sacred but now even more so for flour, the sight and feel of it, its unbaked smell, turns me again toward a Chattanooga 3rd street, its compass river swelling like bread nearby bearing witness still for one cannot say too much about rivers—their irreverence of edges scored, spilling themselves, proclaiming natural gods deeper than memory yet dependent upon it for traced they must be in every human activity, no matter the breech, for something there is to teach even deity though it may be wrong to do so, or hearsay to say it or sing, but the song is there for those whose ears are broken onto bottoms from which cry urgencies of Being and between, dutiful banks barely containing the straining Word.

**From Tibetan Buddhism. Visual meditation devices,
Yantras function as revelatory conduits of cosmic truths.

1. To Bessie Smith,3rd Street Chattanooga (circa 1971)

Already the river begins its sweat.
April to September I'll be on the porch
Come sunsets listening to cars in the
Dark and you, remembering the flour
On the floor and me and Willie in
Stocking feet dancing till dawn,

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poem by Warren Falcon
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The peter-bird

Out of the woods by the creek cometh a calling for Peter,
And from the orchard a voice echoes and echoes it over;
Down in the pasture the sheep hear that strange crying for Peter,
Over the meadows that call is aye and forever repeated.
So let me tell you the tale, when, where, and how it all happened,
And, when the story is told, let us pay heed to the lesson.

Once on a time, long ago, lived in the State of Kentucky
One that was reckoned a witch--full of strange spells and devices;
Nightly she wandered the woods, searching for charms voodooistic--
Scorpions, lizards, and herbs, dormice, chameleons, and plantains!
Serpents and caw-caws and bats, screech-owls and crickets and adders--
These were the guides of that witch through the dank deeps of the forest.
Then, with her roots and her herbs, back to her cave in the morning
Ambled that hussy to brew spells of unspeakable evil;
And, when the people awoke, seeing that hillside and valley
Sweltered in swathes as of mist--"Look!" they would whisper in terror--
"Look! the old witch is at work brewing her spells of great evil!"
Then would they pray till the sun, darting his rays through the vapor,
Lifted the smoke from the earth and baffled the witch's intentions.

One of the boys at that time was a certain young person named Peter,
Given too little to work, given too largely to dreaming;
Fonder of books than of chores, you can imagine that Peter
Led a sad life on the farm, causing his parents much trouble.
"Peter!" his mother would call, "the cream is a'ready for churning!"
"Peter!" his father would cry, "go grub at the weeds in the garden!"
So it was "Peter!" all day--calling, reminding, and chiding--
Peter neglected his work; therefore that nagging at Peter!

Peter got hold of some books--how, I'm unable to tell you;
Some have suspected the witch--this is no place for suspicions!
It is sufficient to stick close to the thread of the legend.
Nor is it stated or guessed what was the trend of those volumes;
What thing soever it was--done with a pen and a pencil,
Wrought with a brain, not a hoe--surely 't was hostile to farming!

"Fudge on all readin'!" they quoth; or "that's what's the ruin of
Peter!"

So, when the mornings were hot, under the beech or the maple,
Cushioned in grass that was blue, breathing the breath of the blossoms,
Lulled by the hum of the bees, the coo of the ring-doves a-mating,
Peter would frivol his time at reading, or lazing, or dreaming.
"Peter!" his mother would call, "the cream is a'ready for churning!"
"Peter!" his father would cry, "go grub at the weeds in the garden!"
"Peter!" and "Peter!" all day--calling, reminding, and chiding--
Peter neglected his chores; therefore that outcry for Peter;
Therefore the neighbors allowed evil would surely befall him--
Yes, on account of these things, ruin would come upon Peter!

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poem by Eugene Field
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