jazz vs. jazz

listening to some old timey
female jazz vocal songs
with sappy trumpet, strings
and one note per bar bass

I do not know
if my excitement to return home
after the cafe
to listen to Miles and Mingus
is sacrilege, good taste, pigeon business
or simply garden-variety monkey mind trick

Frank's

totally engrossed
in the weight of sensation
of behind on seat, feet, plopped on floor
pen in hand, hands on notebook
static with commercial radio ads
sizzle of steak omelet on grill
swoosh of metal cooking utensils
eyes on more than one perception at once
hearing eyes, feeling eyes, visual eyes
trained on Bic flowing across lined paper
at Frank's Falafel House, in dead of pre-dinner rush
I am alone with my thoughts
and with the lonely waitress, who
with big eyes and wrinkles like dimples
waits for my order with me

the grow

the push upward
the pull inward
fill to fill-line
complete the race
you are chasing love
which was at the start
and at the finish
it is the road
it is your heart
the beat that drowns you
has found you
tracing your way back
in circles

mirror of the moment

the quiet of voices
of humming refrigeration
of twangy pedal-steel guitar r&b
the innocence of young women
baring their secrets, for all I know
there, across the room

I sit with these solemn embers
burning bright in the midst of daylight
forever for a moment
in excess of contentment
where an invisible mirror lives
smiling back our luminescence

in the balance

do frogs transmigrate
sideways?
do cats mingle with mice
for any reason other than
family barbecues?
if a wayward word
happens out the side of my mouth
would you come gather it
for your bouquet
of nonsensical contingencies?
and when does the moon
dip below the clouds
to taste of its own reflection
in the ocean, in the lake
in the wild grass and the wine glass?
I cannot answer your simplest question
but I am certain
there is room enough
for every possible solution
in the balance of broken worlds
made whole
by droplets of our desire
to see it so

raintruthJune

when the rain is too heavy
for the earth, for the streets
for the long purple flowers
crushed against the wood chips
sorrow and struggling
against death and wetness
we may finally know
the weight of our desires
is too much for even
our children to bear

the stress test never ends

two and a half minutes, he tells me

until the end of the stress test

but it never will end

he amps up the speed and tilt of the treadmill

I am breathing through my mouth

two and a half minutes

turns to three

to another ten

stretching asymptote toward infinity

my mouth is dry, I can hear my heart

it is gonzo John Bonham, pumping the bass drum

Josh, the lab attendant, pushes at my back

holding me on the treadmill which slows, tilts downward

I am confused and drowning

in the air that surrounds me, that is inside me

there is not enough of it

water would be so good right now

but the ocean is salt

and I am heading for the door

for the water fountain

because you have to start somewhere

when the world is your oyster

and you are allergic to shellfish