Some days I wish I could bend my knees

Lean backwards and wail like a saxophonist

But I know anyone within earshot

Would hear that wrong

There are days

I feel like screaming

But I don’t dare

I’m afraid of what the

Vibrations might cause

On days like that

I like to clamp on headphones

Crank up volume on John Coltrane

Archie Shepp

Albert Ayler

David Murray

James Carter or Branford Marsalis

With their music in my head

I imagine someone else understands 

Hearing other people’s music  

Is comfort  

A confirmation

But having my own song to sing  

My own story to tell is

Something else 

I want to write perfect poems

About imperfection and the misery

Caused by stress and call it a novel

I want to layer images  

Colored with hidden faces

And tumultuous mountain views

Like Emel Sherzad

And splash something meaningful on the spot

I want to express something about how love

Sometimes gets worn threadbare

And can’t retain its grip 

Or how a stripped wing nut screwed

And unscrewed

So many times can no longer

Keep a bolt in place

Where is  space to share

Lessons learned at my mirror

About expressions of abstract truth

Where is an opportunity

To embrace a mysterious stranger

And stretch reflections beyond

Familiarity to something

Resembling wisdom or cosmic funk

Whether meaning matters begs

Another set of issues

Issues in forms of possibilities

Tug at heartstrings  

Mind springs

Like nervous stomach knots

What I feel is what it means

That’s as clear as it gets

What I see is what it says

That’s the story I’m left to tell

But often the only audience for my story

Is my own reflection

The only fountain for my feelings

Is in a town square under siege

Meanwhile…

ImproviXation #107 relies on

Distorted realism and foggy ambiguity

As a green and smoky road map to a truth

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A character named Aunt Nancy (of the Mystic Horn Society) in a novel by Nathaniel Mackey titled Djbot Baghostus’s Run told a story that I believe bears repeating here. This story which another character named Jarred Bottle christened Namesake Anecdote #1, went like this: Aunt Nancy went to see and hear Frank Wright band leader and saxophonist who was playing with his band one night in a New York loft in the early seventies. Wright was in a blowing mood that night; the band came on with a tuneless, ultra-out wall of sound (no head, no recognizable structure), a raucous, free-for-all cacophony which at times had the feel of an assault. The first set went on that way, nonstop, for about an hour and fifteen minutes. During an intermission between sets Aunt Nancy approached Wright and asked if he’d play a request. He said, Yeah. What would you like to hear? She told him China and he said, No problem. The second set, however went just like the first, equally tuneless, equally nonstop, equally without a head or recognizable structure, coming nowhere near the melody line of China. The one difference was that about forty-five minutes into the set Wright let the tenor fall from his mouth and hang by its strap, cupped his hands in front of his mouth like a megaphone and yelled China! China! China! He then took the tenor back to his mouth for another twenty or so no-letup minutes of squeaks, honks, moans, growls and screeches.