Review: Jazz Poems
on Sheila Ash (India), 11/May/2018 07:45, 34 days ago
Jazz PoemsbyKevin YoungMy rating:4 of 5 starsAfter a long wait I finally got a copy of this Everyman Anthology of Jazz Poetry. Loving the music I thought this is a book that needs a place on my shelves. Delving in last night for the first time, I was not disappointed. I found old favourites and some new delights.One of the new delights wasLangston Hughes's poem The Trumpet Player.The text can be found online athttps://www.poemhunter.com/best-poems....You can listen to Hughes himself read this work and others on Spotifyhttps://open.spotify.com/album/2kvceU....You can read more about the man athttps://www.poetryfoundation.org/poet...This poem encapsulates the personal and collective experience of African Americans in a portrait of a jazz trumpeter - stanza 1 is about weariness from the slave experience, stanza 2 is about change specifically the taming of natural hair, stanza 3 is about jazz music, stanza 4 is about desire, to see moonlight on the sea, stanza 5 is back to him playing, carried away by the music, and stanza 6 about how music smoothes away all his troubles.What strikes me is the structure, the minimal punctuation, the smoothness of its reading. There is the repetition of the opening linesThe Negro/ With the trumpet at his lipsmaking it like a musical refrain,After first reading I am in awe at the final two stanzas - how he inverts the more normal sentance structure in(The Negro)Does not knowUpon what riff the music slipsIt's hypodermic needleTo his soul -and how he turns the needle into a positive vehicle for deliverying the suppression of his troubles, rather than the destructive delivery of escapism via drugs that plagued many a musician.Trumpet PlayerThe NegroWith the trumpet at his lipsHas dark moons of wearinessBeneath his eyeswhere the smoldering memoryof slave shipsBlazed to the crack of whipsabout thighsThe NegroWith the trumpet at his lipsHas a head of vibrant hairTamed down,Patent-leathered nowUntil it gleamsLike jet-Were jet a crownThe musicFrom the trumpet at his lipsIs honeyMixed with liquid fireThe rhythmFrom the trumpet at his lipsIs ecstasyDistilled from old desire-DesireThat is longing for the moonWhere the moonlight's but a spotlightIn his eyes,DesireThat is longing for the seaWhere the sea's a bar-glassSucker sizeThe NegroWith the trumpet at his lipsWhose jacketHas afineone-button roll,Does not knowUpon what riff the music slipsIt's hypodermic needleTo his soul -But softlyAs the tune comes from his throatTroubleMellows to a golden note.View all my reviewsashramblings