JAZZ

JAZZ                                                                      

And only to wear blue.

When you talk about love.

Afterward.

When there is no-one

These days are out of time.

That we may begin

To see love’s changing.

I hear alone what you say,

How a sense of indigo falls

In base resonance

Almost motionless.

Scent of jasmine, wild

In the derelict square,

At once we name

Invisible moonlight.

The rhythm of water

Sighs false innocence,

The way a cymbal sound spins.

In the cool of first light

The river scenes shimmer.

What seems a city

Is distant sunrise.

Contraries of night pale

Into harmonies

As morning moves:

Every day a truth revealed.

How you catch the essential

Syncopation,

The stair well chorus,

Impromptu sensations

Of the world at work

Soon we see our masters

In seasons they cannot control.

Count the beat before they speak:

How many lies to Babylon?                                                      

v    

And after music, silence

Days like these are uneasy

With desire all the way down,

Walking out from here

As the mood changes

With phases of love.

This way the waters

Can come no more

Once the heat burns

Every ocean dry.