See, a poem is to words like jazz is to music.
By Patrick O’Neill
See, a poem is to words like jazz is to music.
Anyone can use words, but a poet makes the words
Hop, skip, jump, and jive right off the page.
And jazz does that same thing to an ordinary tune.
Makes the notes all misbehave, you know.
Bounce where they ought to sit,
jog where they ought to walk,
swing their arms and click their heels
when they should stroll, roll
all over the place, know what I mean?
And makes you hum that little itty-bitty riff
from some long-forgotten lullabye,
right where you don’t expect it,
there in the middle
of some big important song.
Poems do that, too.
Poems don’t need no grammar,
don’t need commas, capitals, or verbs, even,
to make you smell the roses
they’re painting on your brain.
It’s the same with jazz.
Tempo, structure, beat, and rhythm.
It’s all there,
just rearranged,
unhooked,
set free,
like trees planted in mid-air.
Look, if most music is arithmetic,
jazz is anatomy.
It’s feet, gut, tears, and wiggles.
It weeps, wails, winces, and whispers.
It clicks, clangs, claps, and clamors,
bips, beeps, and bops.
You gotta feeel this stuff as much as listen.
That’s why you plaaay this music,
the way a poet plays with meaning,
plays on words,plays by heart.
The way God plays with the universe.
What’s that line, the play’s the thing?
Oh yeah.
Ain’t that the truth with all Creative stuff.
