Jazz

Downtown 30 x 22,5 cm ink/watercolour/graphite on paper c/o Karin Goeppert

JASS*

Things spread—germs, people’s opinions,

beer bellies, you name it—

because it’s so hot around here.

Thin sheen of sweat on a working girl’s skin, for instance,

some kind of tense perfume

coming off it, dirty feet shapely in embroidered thongs.

The growth, you can’t believe it, just

keeps coming on, everything from moss

to palmetto to the idea behind a melody.

It would seem that the whole point

of darkness is shouldered into a heap

of syncopated rhythms.

Imagine someone coming along,

scooping them up

in his ditty bag and, walking out the door,

dumping its contents into the water supply.

Odd but happy feelings occur.

Friends start

talking fluent saxophone, eyes red,

blessed with cool and cannabis.

   You question them.

But all you get are tired smiles straight from Birdland.

*Legend or truth, I can’t say, but the term Jazz apparently evolved out

of “jass,” short for jasmine, the preferred scent worn by the prostitutes of

Storyville, New Orleans, birth place of a great American music tradition.

Birdland, of course, a famous jazz club in New York City.