daydreaming w/ Bob Arnold
a tip of the cap to Mike Luster
"Our dear friend and great musician Claude Stephenson passed away (31 Aug. 2023) at his home in Albuquerque's South Valley. Claude played mandolin and guitar, and was truly one-of-a-kind. If you ever met him, you won't forget. Here is his original instrumental Olive Blossom Hornpipe, recorded with Elliott's Ramblers and Byron Berline. Whenever I saw him, I would request we play this tune. I raise my glass and play a tune for you, my friend."
Jeffrey Forbes
Cold Mountain Poems
1.
These days
Men who saw Cold Mountain
In person
Thought him crazy.
Unseemly,
The face apart,
Body in rags & things
Like you shouldn't notice.
What I said
He didn't hear.
What he said
I won't repeat.
Yet
Go on, I tell
Those to come
All ye
Go on
To the Cold Mountain.
2.
Out of clothes? Go find yours.
Don't get a fox to take off his coat.
Wanting food? Pick our own.
Don't trick a goat into providing for you.
To ask for a loan of the pelt
& flesh as well
Is to hold with their sadness & misery,
regrets all around.
The force for good is gone
From the world.
Food & clothing not where they should be.
3.
The poor donkey is short one measure
Of fodder,
The rich dog has three inches of bed straw to spare.
If poverty is not evenly distributed
Wealth and hardship will not meet in the middle.
Just when you begin to provide for the donkey
You make the dogs feel deprived.
Think on this, will you —
It even makes me feel depressed.
4.
Heaven is high, endless.
The earth thick
Thick without end.
Living in between
At the mercy of these powers,
Creatures
Butting heads
For food & warmth,
Eyeing each other's morsels
Would scheme to kill
Heedless
The while.
Why should
A blind child
Wonder about the color of milk?
5.
I saw dogs, by the hundreds
A wild bunch,
Scruffy curs,
The reclining ones happy to lie low
The ones up & about are happy too,
Throw a bone in their midst
& all changes
Everyone begins to growl,
Baring their teeth at each other
Alas, not that there were too few bones
But there were so many dogs
How to share it out?
6.
Pity the mortals
Their feeling habit
Eating at every meal
Never tire
Steamed pork, stir in the garlic paste
Broiled duck
Dip in peppered salt
For a delicate fish broth
Pull out the backbone of a fish
For tenderness
Serve the cheek warm
Its skin on
The bitterness of other things
Others can keep
We get on with
What is sweet
7.
Children, I tell you,
Leave the burning house now
Three carts are at the door,
One to flee the self,
One to save another,
& one more for the way.
Come away,
Children, everyone.
Homeless you shall not be
Abiding by your vehicle.
& if perchance carried alive to
The marketplace
There left to sit empty,
Before
The big sky
You will learn
The ten directions
Have no ups
Nor downs,
Coming or going,
East
Or west, neither
Should prevent you.
8.
People ask the way
To Cold Mountain.
No
Road goes there.
In summer
The ice
Will not shift.
In daylight
Mist
Is all one sees
& how did you
Get there?
How did I?
But your heart is hardly
Like mine,
When it is
There is here.
_________________________
In the Same Light
200 Poems for Our Century
translated by Wong May
The Song Cave, 2022
Land of Never-Ending Holes
I don't want you to leave.
I don't want you to leave this place I so love, where
underbrush, jackrabbits,
and the desert press in on us.
Waiting under a date palm, with a suitcase and cell phone,
listening for the train whistle—this is how I picture you.
Don't strut or you will stumble.
Make your mess into a message.
Make your roof tight and your cothing sufficient,
and you shall never be wanting if you value "the best
property of all —
friends" (Emerson)
Remember the Zen axiom: Nothing lasts, nothing is finished,
and nothing is perfect.
Out there is a land of never-ending holes, where brown is the
new green.
Out there are omnivorous, dazzling human voices—coarse
cries, air falsettos, heady
blues, soul, and solemn low rumbles—speaking and
teaching.
It is never useless to say something or teach someone.
The obscure human soul—it is sad and happy at once.
Men sweep and stir up the dust, but women sprinkle water and
settle it,
sweetening the air.
Out there, it is swarming, venal, frivolous, vexing, crude, and
hypocritical,
but you must never cease to listen, look, and feel.
If you love a zebra, do not settle for a tapir.
Think of all you have so far as a shelter made of tarp and rope,
and build
something marvelous.
Uplift, transformation, radiance—when you turn the old horse
toward them,
he will always pick up his step.
See those bulbous clouds forming over the small San Gabriel
Mountains?
They are greater than any tanks or armored vehicles.
See out there beyond the ash, avocado, lemon, and peppertrees,
a little trail ends at a highway leading to spin rooms and
war rooms,
but also there are bee spawn, motion dazzle, and
maple syrup.
I don't want you to leave.
Out there, in the land of never-ending holes,
may those who love you love you, as in the proverb,
but may God turn the hearts of those who cannot love you,
and if he cannot turn their hearts, may he turn their ankles,
so you will know them by their limping.
_________________
Henri Cole
Blizzard
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
2021
The finest poem in this fine book,
first published as a Claremont McKenna College
commencement poem. I would have liked to
been in the audience.
[ BA ]
I believe now in its thirteenth printing —
a classic work of musicians, poets,
and an editor with a clean eye
to bring in the chorus.
Excellent.
{BA}
Strange Fruit
Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black body swinging in the Southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
Pastoral scene of the gallant South,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolia sweet and fresh,
And the sudden smell of burning flesh!
Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck
For the sun to rot, for a tree to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.
_________________
LEWIS ALLAN
(Made famous by Billie Holiday)
Alone
A friend told me
He'd risen above jazz.
I leave him there.
______________________
MICHAEL S. HARPER
The Fantastic Names of Jazz
Zoot Sims, Joshua Redman,
Billie Holiday, Pete Fountain,
Fate Marable, Ivie Anderson,
Meade Lux Lewis, Mezz Mezzrow,
Manzie Johnson, Marcus Roberts,
Omer Simeon, Miff Mole, Sister
Rosetta Tharpe, Freddie Slack,
Thelonious Monk, Charlie Teagarden,
Max Roach, Paul Celestin, Muggsy
Spanier, Boomie Richman, Panama
Francis, Abdullah Ibrahim, Piano
Red, Champion Jack Dupree,
Cow Cow Davenport, Shirley Horn,
Cedar Walton, Sweets Edison,
Jaki Byard, John Heard, Joy Harjo,
Pinetop Smith, Tricky Sam
Nanton, Major Holley, Stuff Smith,
Bix Beiderbecke, Bunny Berigan,
Mr. Cleanhead Vinson, Ruby Braff,
Cootie Williams, Cab Calloway,
Lockjaw Davis, Chippie Hill,
And of course Jelly Roll Morton.
_______________
HAYDEN CARRUTH
If somebody told me I had only one hour to live,
I'd spend it choking a white man. I'd do it nice and slow.
MILES DAVIS
