OUR FREE UNION

by Zumwalt

with respect to André Breton

Image by the poet using Nano Banana Pro

My country with the hair of embedded fiber-optic cable
With the thoughts of a backed-up four-lane freeway at dusk
With the waist of a redwood in the center of a scenic bypass;
My country with the lips of algae and silt from the Great Lakes

With the cheeks of a ticker tape parade on celluloid stock
With the teeth of a picket fence on a shifting, slumping shoreline;
The tongue of a cracked bell that just rings and rings on command
Of a televised courtroom, a satellite that spies in dark silence;

My country with the eyelashes of high-tension wires
With brows of the upper seats of a sold-out stadium
Of the blue light under the sheets
And of the steam rising from an executive sauna fifty stories high.

My country with shoulders of interstate concrete
And of a hydroelectric dam holding back the stars;
My country with the sticky, messy fingers of a contested ballot box
Of a strewn deck of plastic cards;

My country with armpits of coal dust and scented bubble tea
Of suburban sprawl and the nest of a bald eagle in a cell tower
With arms of Mississippi tributaries and of a thousand assembly lines
And of a mingling of the cornfield and ambushed migrant workers;

My country with legs of elusive wildfires
The movements of a swing state and a jazz festival
Calves of sequoia bark, feet of broken treaties and numbered amendments
Toes of subway tracks and tourists flicking coins into canyons.

My country with a neck of unharvested wheat
A throat of pulsing fiber and high-powered cooling fans
Of a protest stage shrieking in the bed of a dry river
With breasts of the Appalachian night;

With the ribs of a multi-story shopping mall
Of a ghost town shadowed by the noonday sun;
My country with the belly of a thumb-scrolled digital map
With a back of an abandoned silver screen;

My country with a nape of red clay and cooling asphalt
And of the threads of a smudged napkin on a diner counter at 3:00 AM.
My country with hips of a barreling NextGen Acela
With hips of a county rodeo and of Friday night tossed penalty flags

Of a pendulum swinging between fairground stand food and Michelin-rated dining.
My country with bones of Civil War reenactments
With the ligaments of uncirculated library books
With the tendons of a buffalo nickel gifted to a grandchild.

My country with the loins of an offshore drill and the grocery store pharmacy
Of prairie grass and vintage baseball cards.
My country with ears full of rotating sirens
Of eyes of parabolic, steerable radio telescopes.

My country with eyes of a flatscreen TV left on at night
With eyes of a forest gasping for breath…

My country that vowed to love us always:
Our hands held out for answers, trembling within rusty handcuffs.

Zumwalt's poetry feeds on alienation, shifting reality, and forced adaptation. Zumwalt is a repeat contributor to The New Verse News.

SILVER AND GOLD

by Donna Katzin

On April 25, 2023, the world lost beloved artist and activist Harry Belafonte after nearly a century of barrier-breaking music and work for social justice.  He played a major role in the U.S. Civil Rights Movement and anti-apartheid movement, and campaigns at home and abroad. He lived only five years after the death of his renowned friend, Hugh Masekela, who has been described as "the father of  African jazz."  Masekela gave voice to the struggle for freedom in South Africa—and around the world.

 

Their kindred cries

pierced our consciousness,

awakened us with irresistible reveilles

of "Day’O" and blasts of a sleepless horn

on two thirsting sides

of the same ocean.

 

On Calypso waves

and thunderstorms of jazz,

they bore us across seas and continents,

linking melodies and arms with others

in the push and pull of brothers,

igniting voices of a new time.

 

With silver tongue and golden trumpet,

they faced apartheid, Ku Klux Klan, Jim Crow—

unblinking in the face of whips and bullets,

released our inner rivers when we tired,

rekindling the fire in our blood

and our rebellious hearts.

 

They filled our streets with relentless rhythms,

marched with Black miners, laborers hungering

for the promises that gleamed

like ripe bananas in the sun,

mended our torn souls with

lullabies and love songs.

 

Today they are together, once again,

and we are left with their legacies

and indefatigable rhythms.

We can listen, hear them

—Harry and Hugh—

raising hell in heaven.

Donna Katzin is the founding and former executive director of Shared Interest, which facilitates access to credit for low-income Black Southern Africans.  She co-coordinates Tipitapa Partners, which helps feed and empower impoverished mothers and children in Nicaragua, and serves on the board of Community Change in the U.S.  A proud wife and mother, she is also a contributor to New Verse News and author of With These Hands—poems about the "new" South Africa giving birth to itself.

FOOTPRINTS

by Mary K O’Melveny

Wayne Shorter, the enigmatic, intrepid saxophonist who shaped the color and contour of modern jazz as one of its most intensely admired composers, died on Thursday in Los Angeles. He was 89. 

—The New York Times, March 2, 2023

Some people barely tiptoe

through the multiverse, if 

they ever notice it at all.

Others soar on color, line,

on rhythm, tempo, vision.

On poetry swirling like silk.

Listen to that smooth, mellow

tenor sax as he croons, spoons, 

caresses, cajoles, teases, tempts.

His roads were paved with be-bob, 

fusion, funk, hard bop, symphony,

opera, even chamber quartets. 

 

His footprints knew no limits. 

No regrets. Once you start out, 

There is no reason to stop. 

Take his lead. The weather

report is good. The route mellow.

You know some band mates — 

Art Blakey, Miles Davis, Herbie 

Hancock, Esmerelda Spalding, 

Joni Mitchell, Milton

Nascimento, Steely Dan, Carlos 

Santana, Terri Lyne Carrington. 

 

You know some tunes—Juju,

Nefertiti, Iphigenia, Endangered 

Species, Gaia, Speak No Evil.

We all grooved down those paths,

as he soothed our way home. 

Every note was a prompt,

every sound a clue, every tone a 

tricked out treat, every twitch 

a temptation to stop, then soar.

He is now well on his way

along enlightenment’s pathway. 

In the key of cool.

Mary K O'Melveny is a recently retired labor rights attorney who lives in Washington DC and Woodstock NY.  Her work has appeared in various print and on-line journals. Her most recent poetry collection is Dispatches From the Memory Care Museum, just out from Kelsay Books. Her first poetry chapbook A Woman of a Certain Age is available from Finishing Line Press. Mary’s poetry collection Merging Star Hypotheses was published by Finishing Line Press in January, 2020.

THE CONCENTRIC CIRCLES OF WAR

by Katherine West 

“A Room of Memory” by Chiharu Shiota (2009): old wooden windows, group exhibition Hundred Stories about Love, 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Japan

Inside, there's a memory of neighbors on an evening porch, of burning then warming sun, of a half-feral cat leaving freedom for langurous hours of touch, of cold night then the warmth of a shared bed. 

Inside, there's a fire going and moody jazz in the background, an old watercolor of a Ukrainian boy and girl in traditional clothes. They are on their way to market; seen from behind and one side, their bodies are full of purpose. 

Inside, there's the sound of birds outside; sometimes just wings whooshing back and forth, sometimes a little squawk and chatter. Faraway, a songbird. 

Outside, sun is trying to warm the morning. Outside, clouds are burning off; red ants are waking up, appearing at the door of their mound like holy men dressed in the color of life. 

Outside, the first truck rumbles down the gravel road, kicking up its own cloud. Outside, the crack of target practice, to the south, a helicopter.

Outside, the first shell drops on an apartment building already abandoned by its residents who now live in the subway. The first paratrooper touches down. The first tank goes up in flames. 

Outside, the first wildflowers glow like a small sunrise amongst dry, white grass. Outside, the ravens are mating aloft. 

Inside, is poetry from Ukraine. 

You are the train that will pour

burning wine on the skin,

so that it will blaze

madly

(Natalka Bioltserkivets)

Outside, is poetry from Ukraine, a long line of refugees with bundles, like leafcutter ants carrying off the petals of roses.  

Katherine West lives in Southwest New Mexico, near Silver City. She has written three collections of poetry: The Bone Train, Scimitar Dreams, and Riddle, as well as one novel, Lion Tamer. Her poetry has appeared in journals such as Writing in a Woman's Voice, Lalitamba, Bombay Gin, The New Verse News, Tanka Journal, Splash!, Eucalypt, and Southwest Word Fiesta. The New Verse News nominated her poem "And Then the Sky" for a Pushcart Prize in 2019. In addition she has had poetry appear as part of art exhibitions at the Light Art Space gallery in Silver City, New Mexico and at the Windsor Museum in Windsor, Colorado. She is also an artist. 

IT'S NOT OVER TILL IT'S OVER

by Katherine West

In Brazil 600,000 are dead.  The Brazilian jazz band, Farofa, says nothing of this.  They are too immersed in the blessing of music, too busy following and blending genres, traditions, grooves.  They play a Brazilified Tears for Fears song, appropriately, "Everybody Wants to Rule the World."  What happens when there is no world to rule?  Is politics a board game, continuing in heaven?  Do politicians believe they're even going to heaven after selling the planet down the river for a portfolio in their great-grandfather's coal company?  

The violin player is from L.A.  That's where the band met, of course.  He dances as he plays, dances as if he were born in Rio.  The bass player is a comic book character.  If peanuts had a bass player, he would be it.  His big head, with even bigger hair, wobbles without any help from the body whatsoever, like one of those plastic dime store toys I grew up with.  At one point he does a 1970s funk solo.  I close my eyes.  Try to enter the naiveté of Watergate. 

For just one second I've got it:  bell bottoms, afros and ideals, Muddy Waters playing in Peace Park my first year at Mizzou, streaking across the quad to protest the war.  An abstract concept for most of us.  I had never seen anyone with the after-effects of agent orange.  Never seen a metal leg.  Never met anyone with PTSD.

Blindly, I wanted to do the right thing.  I wanted to leave the world a better place for having birthed me, for having said yes to my orphan soul.  

The funk solo ended.  The 70s vanished, leaving nothing behind but that stubborn soul, tossing aside the boring board games to come up to bat one last time, to suss out the pitcher, to grand slam around the bases, run like hell, and hope to reach home before the ump calls me out. 

Katherine West lives in Southwest New Mexico, near Silver City. She hs written three collections of poetry: The Bone Train, Scimitar Dreams, and Riddle, as well as one novel, Lion Tamer.  Her poetry has appeared in journals such as Writing in a Woman's Voice, Lalitamba, Bombay Gin, The New Verse News, Tanka Journal, Splash!, Eucalypt, and Southwest Word Fiesta. The New Verse News nominated her poem "And Then the Sky" for a Pushcart Prize in 2019. In addition she has had poetry appear as part of art exhibitions at the Light Art Space gallery in Silver City, New Mexico and at the Windsor Museum in Windsor, Colorado. Using the name Kit West, Katherine's new novel, When Night Comes, A Christmas Carol Revisited came out in 2020, and a selection of poetry entitled Raising the Sparks will come out in 2021, both published by Breaking Rules Publishing for whom she also teaches Creative Writing workshops.  The sequel to When Night Comes will also be released by BRP in 2021. It is called Slave, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Revisited. She is also an artist. 

TRIPPED UP

by John Van Dreal

The modal jazz—a soothing sound in my earbuds. I navigate 

the determined roots of a white oak clawing their way 

through a sidewalk fracture then stumble and glimpse at the 

edge of the bridge, tucked just under the concrete steps 

leading to the park, a man resting, shrouded in a blue plastic 

tarp. A garbage bag sits, spilling soiled socks, tattered 

underwear, a pair of truly distressed denims over the damp 

grass. A Starbucks paper cup, stuffed with candy bar 

wrappers, lies next to his hand. His sleeping bag is strewn 

over the stair railing, drying in the sun. A few feet away, a 

shopping cart adorned with strands of decayed ivy, wet rags, 

an orange safety cone, a dog leash, and silver tinsel leans 

against a bridge post. The tinsel doesn’t make sense.

 

My mind mutes the tune—its moderate, melodic tempo 

transposing to the smell of dampness and urine. It reminds

me of the high school locker room when I was fifteen. It’s 

not a nostalgic smell.

 

 

Compassion fatigue. I’ve become numb to these scenes—the 

new normal in my city.

 

In the past, I was acutely concerned. Each person living on 

the street advising me on guilt—their threadbare accessories 

and refuse a reminder of my failed humanity. I often felt 

compelled to do something, but secretly wished they would 

return to the trees, out of sight.

 

I know there must be a middle ground, between passion and 

indifference.

 

 

I head back to town, through the park, focused on the music. 

Miles reminds me that it’s just blues. That’s all it is. My 

thoughts turn to a book on Andrew Wyeth. My life has 

always been a painting composed collaboratively by the 

gods of biogenetics and my parents but left for me to add 

color, value, form. Now, my kids add glazes of translucent

monochromatic tone, like thin, colored slices of stained glass 

held over the entire canvas. Each layer subtly unifying the 

whole. There is an awkward aesthetic, but so far it is 

working. It could have been different, though. It still could 

be.

 

I look back at the resting man. That’s me in a different 

universe. That’s any of us.

A third-generation artist, John Van Dreal began painting and writing at age seven. He earned his formal education in Fine Arts at Humboldt State University and Brigham Young University and educational psychology at Brigham Young University, maintaining careers in both fields while writing. A musician and award-winning artist with work featured in collections throughout the Pacific Northwest, Van Dreal uses his creative vision and accessible writing style to explore both the darker and quirkier sides of human behavior. He resides in Salem, Oregon and is currently composing his first novel.

WHITE TURNS TO BLACK

by Mary Clurman

i.

don’t know Black

don’t think Black

don’t speak Black

but like to listen

hear the sharp breaks

twists and turns

White is privilege.

In COVID

we garden

        cook

 think bitter thoughts

await a different regime.

ii.

Hasn’t changed yet!

Not for better:

Made the ballot secret 

  Blacks can’t vote if they can’t read—

can’t win anyway—

  Don’t even try!

  Only eggheads need good schools

   and what do eggheads know?

 Bus ‘em!
     so what,

      got no brains to think with anyway.

Then came jazz.

Music changed.

Boys of Summer

black, winning

Shut the doors!

  Keep ‘em out!

basketball 

Blues 

Hip-Hop

Thurgood Marshall Martin King Anita Hill

strong black middle class

iii.

Who was it

Packed the court,

just stacked ‘em in!

forgetting

           They still get to serve us coffee

coughing 

while our white blood flows as red as it can get. 

It’s time Whites learn from Black.

Mary Clurman, Princeton, NJ, retired Montessori teacher, struggling with the virus news and changing what I can.

JANUARY 11, 2016 — FOR ZIGGY

by Bill Hurley

David Bowie turned 69 recently.

I turned 69 recently.

18 months ago, David Bowie found cancer in his body.

18 months ago, I found cancer in my body.

Two days ago, David Bowie still had cancer.

Two days ago, I still had cancer.

Yesterday, David Bowie died.

Yesterday, I did not.

Instead, I woke up, ate some oatmeal, played the piano,

Went to a garden, photographed statues and banyan trees,

Sipped a latte while browsing through Dorothea Lange pictures,

Had lunch in a museum café, went to a jazz concert,

Then helped the sun set in a drumming circle on the beach.

Today, I woke up again and learned that David Bowie did not.

So what am I to do with this one more day?

And how many more will I be given 

Before it’s my turn 

To return 

To Stardust?

Bill Hurley is a retired video/multimedia producer and former broadcaster.  He is a frequent contributor to open mikes around Columbus, Ohio. His work has appeared in Common Threads, The Institute for Poetic Medicine, and he won the 2005 Thurber Treat award given by Thurber House for humor/parody writing. This year he is the humor juror for The Ohio Poetry Association’s Competition for high school poets. He recently was the featured reader at The Poetry Forum. He also is the MC for the annual Poetry at Perkins event at Ohio Wesleyan University. His collection, No Weeds in Wahkeena is available on Amazon.

DECEMBER ONCE AGAIN

by Diana Woodcock

"Jazz Beat" painting by Debra Hurd

What can I write to shed light
on this dark December night?
A Connecticut town grieves for
twenty-six dead—victims of the latest
school shooting.  Tibetans are setting
themselves on fire for freedom,
ninety-five since February, 2009.
Listening to musicians walking the bass,
feathering the line, I let the blues take me,
wrap me in the Great Mystery.

All are one, meant to sing and sway
together, to love.  The blues is all about
love, longing, loss, listening,
improvising, sharing our stories and
struggles, recognizing each other
as sister and brother.

Look into the faces around you
moved by music—see how they
seem familiar?  What better way
to pray for justice, an end to violence,
than to sway to the swing of jazz?

A Pakistani girl shot in the head
because the Taliban cannot understand
her hunger and yearning for higher
learning; they do not recognize
she is their sister.  Let the blues take me.
shape my prayer for peace, lead me
to transcend nihilism, alienation.

Listening to the blues, to the sounds of
migrant workers in this oil-rich desert town.
Thinking about blood diamonds,
underground railroads, women and girls
sold into the sex trade.

This is Advent season, time
for preparing for the light.
Long dark December nights.
Listen to the blues.  Gaza.  Aleppo.
Keep listening.  The call to prayer
mid-day, the mosque.  Revisionist
Zionist leaders.  Jihad.  Refugees.
Cambodian children amputees
still playing among landmines.

Dear jazz drummer, please
keep feathering the line.


Diana Woodcock’s first full-length collection, Swaying on the Elephant’s Shoulders—nominated for a Kate Tufts Discovery Award—won the 2010 Vernice Quebodeaux International Poetry Prize for Women and was published by Little Red Tree Publishing in 2011.  Her chapbooks are In the Shade of the Sidra Tree (Finishing Line Press), Mandala (Foothills Publishing), and Travels of a Gwai Lo—the title poem of which was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.  She has been teaching at Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar since 2004.  Prior to that, she lived and worked in Tibet, Macau and Thailand.

REVIEW: FALL CONCERT 2010

by Robert Farmer

 

To the piano in his own sweet way
on the arm of the conductor,
while the packed-house crowd stood,
sang Happy Birthday through tears.
On his ninetieth, not just another gig.

He pulled us back to festivals
and the 50’s college stands,
our youth now gray throughout,
old ladies in dress circle
dancing again to Take Five.

His chops still simple, straight, lyrical,
no pyrotechnical improvisation.
Our age ordered silence on the solos
as we grazed back through lives
to sounds once lost,
now avengefully heralded
by today’s Downbeat recognition.

The Cleveland Symphony played backup,
then stood and cheered.

 
Robert Farmer is a retired professor of forest ecology who lives in Cleveland. He occasionally publishes poems in various journals, including New Verse News.