Jazz Interaction With SymbolsBy Sarah T.
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Jazz Interaction With Symbols
Four different-purposed birds
Six-and-one divergent churches
All set in circles and steeples.
Serpents slither into the innocent
notions and oceans of ideas
horizon lines ships and wishes
irate lies smiling from behind pretty eyes.
Town criers never know the joke or
the jokester at the crossroads
‘though griots[i] go along
and understand the meaning
of the jokester’s song.
Holy women handle azaleas,
Holy men buzzard lope
minuet and swing
age-old coquettes
church folk
holding honeysuckle
bedbugs,
buzzards,
and the hum of earthbound angels in their hands.
The stories that we tell ourselves
of ourselves,
in symbols:
the shape of an old man’s face
a storm from outer space
the cackling curmudgeon
with top hat and crutches
black shades
fingertips
a shaky grip
on his cane
(he is lame)
feigning innocence
with his limp
and swinging a
simple
stealthy
symbol-ridden staff.
The pains of birth carved into
the world’s girth/
archetypes
antidotes
omens:
overseers of Edens
investing sudden seeds of themselves
in granite and gold
and gloves
bringing their underlings
and the scent of smoldering skin
upon the wind.
A dove:
The blood has blown over.
Blessings have begun.
Self-less spring winds
whistle and sing
in blessed
bone
redemption.
Exemption
Absolution
Baptism:
symbolism
of sudden acceptance/
Quite-right rite of passage
into pastures having
staffs
shepherds
and sheep
(salvation)
sleep
green fields
peace like a river.
Cakes
made by Mabel
who baked them:
sunshine!
gleaming with sweetness and bees
“Our Fathers” uttered on unending knees.
Trees
Bees
Butterflies
Children’s cries
Cane stalks
Hawks and
Gentlemen callers
singing songs in symbols
exalting exaltations and praises
naming archetype names and
identifying archetypal allies:
Brown eyes
Valleys
A vessel
Vestments
A criss-cross
Contraptions
Candles
A sheath
Sheep
A symbol
A symptom
A sword
Syringes
A blink
Its eye
A lash
Black cats
Jaguars
That which is jagged
That over which we haggle
Sugar Smacks
That which still needs sweetening
Sweetness
A sigh.
Alexandrine adages in other languages
All saying, “to remember” and “it’s been a long time”
The truth behind a lie
Revelation
Praying
Day
Daylight
Lightening
Leaves
Fear no evil
Eve
Ease
and peace that surpasses all understanding.
[i] This poem was written before I learned the correct term for the individual I wished to reference. A person who keeps the history of a tribal community, remembers its royal lineages, and performs its oral histories is called a djali, according to Lesina Martin, Washington, DC-based West African dance instructor. Griot is both a narrower definition for an African storyteller and a French colonial term. Thank you to Lesina. S.T.
Six-and-one divergent churches
All set in circles and steeples.
Serpents slither into the innocent
notions and oceans of ideas
horizon lines ships and wishes
irate lies smiling from behind pretty eyes.
Town criers never know the joke or
the jokester at the crossroads
‘though griots[i] go along
and understand the meaning
of the jokester’s song.
Holy women handle azaleas,
Holy men buzzard lope
minuet and swing
age-old coquettes
church folk
holding honeysuckle
bedbugs,
buzzards,
and the hum of earthbound angels in their hands.
The stories that we tell ourselves
of ourselves,
in symbols:
the shape of an old man’s face
a storm from outer space
the cackling curmudgeon
with top hat and crutches
black shades
fingertips
a shaky grip
on his cane
(he is lame)
feigning innocence
with his limp
and swinging a
simple
stealthy
symbol-ridden staff.
The pains of birth carved into
the world’s girth/
archetypes
antidotes
omens:
overseers of Edens
investing sudden seeds of themselves
in granite and gold
and gloves
bringing their underlings
and the scent of smoldering skin
upon the wind.
A dove:
The blood has blown over.
Blessings have begun.
Self-less spring winds
whistle and sing
in blessed
bone
redemption.
Exemption
Absolution
Baptism:
symbolism
of sudden acceptance/
Quite-right rite of passage
into pastures having
staffs
shepherds
and sheep
(salvation)
sleep
green fields
peace like a river.
Cakes
made by Mabel
who baked them:
sunshine!
gleaming with sweetness and bees
“Our Fathers” uttered on unending knees.
Trees
Bees
Butterflies
Children’s cries
Cane stalks
Hawks and
Gentlemen callers
singing songs in symbols
exalting exaltations and praises
naming archetype names and
identifying archetypal allies:
Brown eyes
Valleys
A vessel
Vestments
A criss-cross
Contraptions
Candles
A sheath
Sheep
A symbol
A symptom
A sword
Syringes
A blink
Its eye
A lash
Black cats
Jaguars
That which is jagged
That over which we haggle
Sugar Smacks
That which still needs sweetening
Sweetness
A sigh.
Alexandrine adages in other languages
All saying, “to remember” and “it’s been a long time”
The truth behind a lie
Revelation
Praying
Day
Daylight
Lightening
Leaves
Fear no evil
Eve
Ease
and peace that surpasses all understanding.
[i] This poem was written before I learned the correct term for the individual I wished to reference. A person who keeps the history of a tribal community, remembers its royal lineages, and performs its oral histories is called a djali, according to Lesina Martin, Washington, DC-based West African dance instructor. Griot is both a narrower definition for an African storyteller and a French colonial term. Thank you to Lesina. S.T.
Sarah T. is a writing instructor, poet, and spoken word performer. Her first book, This Past Was Waiting for Me, is a collection of poetry and epistolary prose that explores the manner in which the past—especially America’s colonial past and the race-class hierarchies that it established—plays out in the present. An excerpt of her novel-in-progress appeared in Volume 1, Issue 10 of Azure. Her other work has appeared in Everyday Feminism, The Rumpus, and Sally Hemings Dreams 'zine.
Sarah T. is also Sarah J. Trembath, a graduate of Temple and Howard universities. She teaches at American University and lives in Anacostia, SE, DC with her husband and son.