New Day Jazz

Justin Desmangles

Soledad

by Robert Hayden



(And I, I am no longer of that world)

Naked, he lies in the blinded room
chainsmoking, cradled by drugs, by jazz
as never by any lover's cradling flesh.

Miles Davis coolly blows for him:
O pena negra, sensual Flamenco blues;
the redclay foxfire voice of Lady Day

(lady of the pure black magnolias)
sobsings her sorrow and loss and fare you well,
dryweeps the pain his treacherous jailers

have released him from for a while.
His fears and his unfinished self
await him down in the anywhere streets.

He hides on the dark side of the moon,
takes refuge in a stained-glass cell,
flies to a clockless country of crystal.

Only the ghost of Lady Day knows where
he is. Only the music. And he swings
oh he swings: beyond complete immortal now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pictured here; Romare Bearden
Profile/Part I, The Twenties:
Maudell Sleet's Magic Garden

Genre

Jazz

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