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.

AFTERIMAGE

by Cathleen Cohen

Portrait of Kaylin Johnson (KJ) painted by Cathleen Cohen for the Johnson family as part of the Soul Shots Project the mission of which is to bring attention to and memorialize the lives lost and tragically altered due to gun violence. KJ was shot and killed in Philadelphia in July 2021.

Painting KJ’s portrait, I peer

at an image of this beautiful boy, shot

in his parked car, waiting

 

to ferry friends to soccer practice.

His mother sends photos that capture

his smile, his jaunty shoulders.

 

I can tell he was quick

with jokes, sparking others.

His mother says he’d jump 

to carry heavy bags 

for older neighbors,

even strangers.

 

The boy who shot him

was a stranger.

Afterimage is illusion.

The brain persists in seeing

what’s removed.

 

Sometimes color memory

is repressed,

sometimes brighter.

 

I cry when I take up the brush.

What about skin tone?

Reference photos lack 

saturation

and I never met him.

Or background?

 

Brick red for urban houses?

Cobalt for sky—something

hopeful?

Cathleen Cohen was the 2019 Poet Laureate of Montgomery County, PA. A poet, painter and teacher, she created the We the Poets program for children. Her poems appear in journals such as Apiary, Baltimore Review, East Coast Ink, North of Oxford, One Art Journal, Passager, Philadelphia Stories, Poetica, River Heron Review, and Rogue Agent. She authored Camera Obscura (Moonstone Press), Etching the Ghost (Atmosphere Press) and Sparks and Disperses (Cornerstone Press). Her artwork is on view at Cerulean Arts Gallery.

HERE'S TO THE GREATNESS WE INAUGURATE

by Chris O'Carroll

The issues your wise tweets elucidate,
The tone you’ve done so much to elevate,
Lawsuits you’ll never settle (oh, but wait),
Women not hot enough to violate,
The torture you have pledged to reinstate,
The faith you feign but can’t quite fabricate,
The sanity you sometimes simulate –
These are the things that make our country great.

The faux respect world leaders cultivate
Now that a cartoon is a potentate,
The brownshirt crowd to which you gravitate,
The autocrats you hope to emulate,
Life-saving health care you’ll eliminate,
Your plastic swagger as you vacillate,
The bloated deity you venerate
In every mirror – these things make us great.


Chris O'Carroll has been the featured poet in Light, and has published poems in Angle, The Asses of Parnassus, The Orchards, Parody, and The Rotary Dial, among other journals.  D****d T***p has never called him "overrated."