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Jazz Poetry
Two Views from the Club, 1991
By
DANIEL M. SHAPIRO,
Published: September 26, 2004
Daniel M. Shapiro
Daniel M. Shapiro lives in Tucson, Arizona. He is an assistant editor for the literary magazine Lily, and his work has appeared in several online and print magazines... for Elvin Jones (1927-2004)
Outside the club
at 131 West Third Street,
neon signs lose their glare
in the stillness of snowflakes
that mark a late spring. A rumble
perplexes pedestrians accustomed
to subway cars or thunder, but
neither has a presence here or now.
Inside the club called the Blue Note,
Elvin Jones glistens through a drum solo,
a sustained cacophony of color. Typical
sticks aside, he performs with tympani
mallets, locomotion forceful enough
to make the cotton tips disintegrate into
the air, to float above the audience in
a delicate stream, a truth serum that belies violence.
