Once Again From The Top

 AN IDEA OF IMPROVISATION WITH THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE—”Take X

towards a freer jazz with ashes buried under some trees by a ¿dead? cat in a different key

say we shrug and enter

what are not shrubs

but surely feel nearly full

of sharp edged petals

which seem to shield fruit

that could perhaps function 

—beloved—as chromatic points 

tho not in the pentatonics

of The Black Raspberries

would we lapse

into a longing to grasp

and risk crimson pinches

not knowing

if a light note later

the hidden position 

of a thorn section

might tincture i 

or for a time mean

some conjugation 

of tidal desire dug by Kearney

from a Pointillist tone poem 

of a pond which needed

tailoring on the hems by Cécile

or Nate or Cecil pleating 

theories of jazz 

we failed to scan

from “Le Front Cache”

or even the knees 

of a more natural man

or Haitian woman, yet 

kept modeling or yodeling—

our speech still a performance

—beyond the velocity

of wavy phrases

or sleepy Harriet mulling

over a syntax of velvet

deities which Apophenia—

our mellow diva—

dreams to bray or splay

how bananas it could be

if they’re yellow berries

or genetic diagrams

guarding walls around

Gardens of Truth

but maybe just feel like felt 

under a trio of Winter Leaves

where some shade in or abrade 

those feathery parakeet feelings 

which color what appears 

to change or even changes 

to appear if we sigh 

then aim to measure 

our berried desire

with a green silence 

bladed nearly to the point 

of a sound science?

AN IDEA OF IMPROVISATION 

WITH A MAN CARRYING A THING

(for Roy Hargrove)

A blue melody means to atone

in only one sense.

Illustration: the scale 

of a man’s shape on stage

means what he carries

 attunes our eyes.

Say he notes the moon

as a whole.

Say he tongues his muted horn

like a missing tooth

seeking to mark

a single valve as key.

Say in moonlight the scales of tuna 

can seem a silvery blues.

Should we then resist the sense 

 one feels him weave 

into the yellow & blue tails 

of the tune as needs

(muted notes almost perceived

as written melodies,

a certain scale of uncertain roots)

air moving past a reed to ease

the Harmon into harmony

with a thing whose valves 

might open & close all night

or hurry a heart

as the ghost of Autumn Leaves

on a key breeze of cursive notes

at once less tuned than assumed?

We must not seek to soak

in such cobalt assaults all night,

but what cratered moon 

doesn’t mean to carry

some “Definition of Blue” 

beyond the empty stage

he leaves.