Jazz Is

Jazz Is

by Moe Seager

Jazz Is

A way in to a way out

Way up down deep inside

In the feel, of the thought
Where the pulse resides
 
Jazz is an audio odyssey

A jet stream blowing in from Ghana

Belted out in Congo Square

A round trip ticket round

The world of Africa and Africa touched

Jazz is

A man down and out in Chicago

Jamming and trancing beyond tomorrow

Jazz is a cat in a Pittsburgh club
A Fury in passion, melodious love
A Diva in Detroit baring her soul
Bring down the house
In turns hot and cool 
Jazz is a child with a sense complex

A feel for a world beyond that given

Jazz is Havana throwing off heat

Blaze of a trumpet, bodies in beat

Jazz is a Jew on a clarinet

No hold back, he lets it rip

Jazz is a Gypsy on a wagon stoop

Strumming new found sounds in his finger tips

Jazz does a duo with Mozart and Bach

A spoon in tune with Cafe Vienna

And Jazz is a niche on a back-street in Paris

Rendezvous lovers, loners and Poets.

Jazz doesn't know solitary confinement

Be big band, be bop,

Slow motion shuffle

Be ballad, be blue,

Lay back and be cool

Be riding the groove
Come in and go out

Each time unique

Like the last time

Jazz is
A cargo the trade winds sail

To the door of the depot of the lost and found

To ring your ears and throb your heart

Stormy Monday turning sunny

Feel the blues depart

Jazz is
A riff that walks me home

Is a bass line I climb to the top of the stairs

Is the hand holding mine when nobody cares

Jazz softly whispers - I know how you feel

Jazz is

Chump change and scratch

Is chewing through the gristle

To suck on the bone

Jazz is a holler, a cat call, a hymn

Jazz is singing saxophone in the shower

Jazz goes uptown to get down

Calls night time the right time

And the right time is now

Jazz Is

An instrument of fingers and tongues

A vessel of muscle and breath

Body and mind in sync with itself

Jazz time tics free off the clock

A serpentine march out of formation

Jazz can leap to the end of the line

Make every stop along the block

A teller of history, a history maker

Jazz is forgiveness and Jazz is a bitch!

She's the mother load

Jazz is

Sweet smells of incense, of Jasmin, of hormones

Deep note moans, high pitch groans, twists and turns

Sharps that burn, flats that howl

Guitar licks that sparkle

Drum beats driven off the four corner map

Jazz is
A gas, a liquid
A solid mass of essence
A floating island centered
In the infinite sea
So vast is Jazz
So deep and wide
How the Middle Passage
Placed us side by side

Jazz is a family
A fraternity of man
Whose taproot is the music of the Af-ri-can
Poly-rhythmic pollination from the talking drum

Graced in gospel, rolls of ragtime

Tears and laughter of the blues

The gifts of many makers

Freely given me, freely given you

Jazz Is

A way in to a way out

Way up down deep inside

A way to, a path through

The mindless rubble,

The poison propaganda

Cross you over to another side

Jazz Is
No papers, no passports,
No human claims denied

No charges pressed, no back-seat guests

Welcome to a dynasty of open borders

Jazz is

A Free Country