It was the best night of my life...
after having come back from playing my fife,
I was just working on my ligerature
When I saw a distant figure.

It approached me with a cold surrounding air,
Beckoning me to join in its heir.
I looked for its face,
And saw the blessing of Charles Mingus's grace.

He slowly walked up and whispered ever so quite,
"Have you ever made a sacrifice for the Mingus ever so pliant?"
I replied back:
"I have not, I apologize for the lack."

but unfortunately, it was not enough,
So he grabbed me by the collar, ever so ruff,
And told me tentatively,
"I am the only God, I deserve only your worship attentively."

So I bowed down to my controller,
My holy Excalibur,
The one who put me to sleep,
The one who has come to reap.

Thomas, Tommy baby,
you are both hot,
and sweet.

Tom Cat you’re red hot--
when I catch you in your Tom Cat Strut,
sauntering across campus,
strolling like it ain’t no thing,

cuz it don’t meant a thing
if it ain’t got that swing baby.

So dig this, Tommy Gun,
you groove with the best of ‘em
when I spot you strollin’—

Your head, teetering left and right like a seesaw, boppin’ baby,
arms hangin’ loosely, swinging freely, wildly, go! go!
legs scooping forward in boisterous trombone slides--
Groooooove Tommy baby!

You’re Louis’s best blows--
ten feet from the mic and the Fives baby,
you’re hot, red hot,
any closer and I'll burn up!
Go!

But you’re cool, real cool,
and oh so sweet.
Super sweet--

in your beard like a pepper and salt shaker tossed across the table,
I look to see those rosy lips part,
and peep those pearly whites shinin' like the bell of Louis’s cornet
brandished in the air, under those ballroom lights--
you’re screamin’ Tommy!

Let me hear that laugh that shakes the room,
punches like Blakey’s bass drum,
thumps like Mingus--

T-Bird you’ve got that hard bop in your soul,
you’re gonna bop to the top TB,
into the third heaven where the angels fall in line to your swing,
that incessant strut that keeps the devil at bay,
Blow! Blow! Blow!

And I see you now Tom Cat,
up there in the clouds,
digging your way across eternity,
bopping and jiving, swinging and blowing,

in your faded khaki pants and worn tennis shoes,
loosely buttoned collared shirt,
tight rectangular glasses that glistened the bell of your eyes even more--
I gotta stand twenty feet away Tommy baby!

You glance down at me and wink,
rearing your head back to let loose that Mingus and Blakey
bottom-end laugh,
guffaw guffaw guffaw!!!

--so hearty and rich,
the backbone of every nervous first-year classroom,
and the sniggering seniors you continued to befuddle and dazzle
with your mysterious ways
and insatiable swing.

So blow, Tommy Gun, blow!
Go Tom Cat go!
Dig T-Bird dig!
Let loose Tommy boy!

Swing for us, swing swing swing--
Hot and Sweet, Tommy baby,
hot and sweet.

We met over the flat lands of dream chasing
Where our common passion and will brought us 13,000 feet into the stars
Fire pits and lunch bells had never brought people closer to a reachable goal
She was the definition of beauty
With quiet hints of fire and eloquence
She could move mountains
And that's what she did
You could see it in her eyes
True desire for completion
She grew as tall as the trees we were surrounded by
And they could not contain her
She was as free and bold as the mountain peaks we lived on
As calm and gentle as the breeze that embraced us each morning
And as mysterious as the secrets she never told
The rocky paths we took jolted our heartbeats and shook our cores
But brought us to our destinies
She wanted nothing more than to be a small ripple in that lake
A small dose of change in a world that needed something more
She became my rock
That supported me on my way to self discovery
She never chipped
She never cracked under the heat or pressure
She watched as I burned everything that made me who I was
She became the wind that blew me into the right direction
And the trails that lead me home safely
That mountain captivated us only for a short moment
But she is still captivating me to this day
And nothing was more breathtaking then the views from Mingus Mountain
Until I left the mountain and really looked at her

tracing circles within circles
on a blue eyed afternoon
concentric breaths inhaled
on a current laced with bloom

into August morning tides
where the pull is slack
inside memories’ fading weight
receding half past black

how thoughts flicker in a circular motion!
how breezes cut the vernal flow
hyacinths whistle their devotion
of God’s reflected glow

perfect circles of a hometown summer
born of heat and light and haze
perfect circles in the ether
spherical stay the solstice days

The jukebox plays that old time swing
What a wild sound, a jumping fling
I've got it bad today, a fever for you
Think of us, when I'm feeling blue
Sinatra say that having it bad,
Well it ain't good and I'm so glad

So when I'm down and out, I'll turn you on
That old timey jazz, for me it's the only one

Art Tatum I'll turn you up loud
Swanky Szabo, amasses a crowd
Slim Gaillard, that crazy sound
Teagarden's trombone all around
Mingus and Ayler, Rollins and Miles
Dalindeo and Niechęć all those styles

I'll dance the moonlight serenade
and these hepcats, will never fade
Dry up daddy-o and focus on sanity
Sonny still struttin' with such vanity
Wayne Shorter quartet on a starry night
Jazz has me goofy but feeling alright

I've been feeling grummy for far too long
Remedied with an old Billie Holiday song

Imagine young Rita to be
too small to walk Mingus properly
And instead of a yuletime stroll
a one-dog sled team over yonder hill rolls

Screaming
They do not hear this
Because they're too busy
Doing worthless ****
And pretending that they exist

For a moment you think
You ******* Elon Musk this is a simulation
And this is my realisation
Call me Nick Bostrom and my thought
Is Blood sweat and simulated tears
Because

I observe a figure walking down a street
And in my disorientation I stare at them
Unflinchingly and they stare back and laugh
Like they know me so I'm like what the ****
Who was that guy I'm so confused I swear

**** **** kick a brick that forms part of a wall
Ye Olde England see an Olde man screaming
Abandon hope! Sinner Jim Whitney
Call me Charles Mingus you are the Sinner Lady
And I play my saxophone for you

Sign this page and hand yourself to God
And through this holy book this ancient relic
I save you for you are a sinner
You Jim Whitney repent to rejoice in heaven
There you'll find Dante and Milton
Writing free verse poetry with Christ himself
Resurrected and now

Save the Children with Unicef
Or buy the Big Issue
Would you like a Burrito or a coffee
Or take this money which I loan thee
**** that I feel like you owe me
And I'll spit on your grave and tax your family
Call me Milton Friedman welcome to the economy

Or would you rather let it all go and find the Dharma
There's a Pure Land temple only a train journey away
Come I'll take you there find Abhidhamma
I know you're lost in this postmodern age

Sickness disorientation your mind so blurry
This disorientation the unfocused intensity
Feeling like you don't exist and everything is
So horribly sick and

Walking down a street in all your disorientation
And you're half dead half asleep half existent
Wanting a ******* coffee but you have no money
So you settle for an energy drink that tastes like ****

But you need the caffeine so you can't complain
And your miserable face and ridiculous gait
Is the elephant in the room you ******* good for nothing
******* and why are you even here
Pseudo intellectual half wit

Stop reading Camus you miserable ****
Start watching Love island like any normal
******* miserable person that lives
On this sceptered isle to paraphrase
Shakespeare and revel in your heritage

Aren't you proud to be British
No what is worse what is worse
To be British or to be human
Why am I associated with that flag
That flies on the tower of the house of God
That I observe as I squint my eyes

The Sun is hot but I am cold
I'm very cold so I wear a coat
And a passerby says what the ****
And the wall is my glue yes the wall is my glue

**** look they opened the coffee shop
I want a coffee this energy drink
Tastes like ****
So throw it away
Like life and

Laugh at the pathetic little joke
From a pseudo intellectual
Pseudo poetic poet that cannot write
About this ache they feel…

All this disorientation…
None of it interpretable.
And this poem is never-ending
Unless it just ends.

In her eyes you can see death himself smiling back at you telling you a date. She has no clue i say in my mind, not but one clue!. She goes with him only wanting his eyes, they're bodies soon lay in **** sweat.
            The wind cooled off the room, and soon everything was quite. Hello? sounds a faint voice of a british school girl in search of her Rolling stone father. He left with cold war and the silence lasted long. Her tender eyes met his one day, old and frail. He died knowing she stood for everything she stood for; Love,hate,war,fight, *** and the slightest thought of Homosexuality, yes ADONAL Homosexuality.
         She walked the lonesome evening with the icy fear of death but it hit her other wise- she died hopping to find her old father humble and beautiful in the night. HEaven smelt of jazz and Claire de lune, the gods played Mingus for days and then some rock and roll, HA! devils music they called it.
         Where are we? and god said, you are in my hunting ground for bad men wanting the clouds. sure its a beautiful place but its hot here, its uncomftorable for me. Please believe me like all the other poor ******* who did. All those idiots and stupid folk queers, rapists, phycos , Negros and the Notorious white man himself… believe me. How else would you live without dying? this gives me comfort for all else is but a ******* lie and a promise i have made to you, i will not die? *******. Is this why we have religion? to comfort man from the thought of death?
       Stop breathing on me.

…ah um
quit the pandering and
spin a pipe’s worth of Mingus or
maybe Baker or Parker
(They know how to Say What You're Livin'
a guide to the soul of the sleep
or talkin' like a train on the brink of de-
railing for 30 miles
       but makes it safely to Wichita as planned.)
3:30AM it’s junkies for some kinda animal fix w/
old hip & old ****** tastebuds up
this late, or early I’m trying to re-
   -lapse here;
mechanism too open a-
live nerve
          for ravenous divinations &
spirited conquest(s)

I pray not to other gods but
move on the winds that blow dust in my eyes
let my language blur in-
between
the lines; surgically
to let me
bleed it out
        not betray my civility
not let my opinion
        betray my humility
not let my privileges
in certain contexts negate
my perspective
No I don’t pick between sides that’s where you
over
&
oversimplified
implied a divide
w/ language bastardized
& sanitized;

Ain’t a justice I could speak that would last a sentence
in any good book of his/or/hers who slime
when wet, gush & *****, cold statues
in busy-international-style-hotel-lobbies
silk’d swollen appendages & curly greasy-
    -haired oven spread
                               for POWER, power brunch boardroom glory
gory foreplay mocking dirtypoor magnolia seed, plucking peony petal
like a Shrink in shadow of a pedigree now
a judge, small & snide in righteous court-dress for play-
            time.

...Brothers & Sisters

(they) drink my fluid’s ******
-You, eat the will
of my friend the human pet
Slither your plasmic bones in fetal mix
unclaimed foundlings
        pink genitalias
go you writhe on-top uh i ou-
        -r taxdollars
fossilized uh programmed sickness squirm
in maggotmouthed machinations for
the egg of uh saint in lieu of true hue
Them Birds
          (onna island) of parasites;
crass utensil in aid your digestible
stasis-


You Sheep Boy
You? Sheep Boy
You, Sheep Boy?
You! Sheep Boy!
You Sheep! Boy felt the transformation
          when you were told. How’d it feel?
I lost my madness when I let myself die
inna only dream If I had a voice
half as clever as Joyce…
If I had a voice, it’d make-a disassociated rant
into a plea for sanity! it be a salt-stained sailor up
against his Nature to caress a braindead angry sea into
a wise & benevolent guide;

Not uh god I know
gave me a compelling answer not uh one
an I wish they had b’
         cause I don’t always feel so well
I could use another crutch…
Not uh one
head talking on my TV
can be-hold the spectrum to apply
just one, single colour, in your carnation’s eye
If it was so simple how come uh monkey can’t do it?
Ain’t uh monkey I know
         that-a keep its spine upright
that
ain’t gotta taste for its own kind
You’re right
but so is he right she right we will fight
left        right
up
down
uptown downtown outtatown
North South East West
babble on O babble on everywhere
ah um do please hit your marks
         & follow the rhythm
       of the next body over;
Pass around worn-out clichés uh penny given
you put 2 of them to-
gether
we call that uh valid opinion
where I’m from;
Not uh man I know mean what he say
and
sometimes not uh thought in
my brain make any of those
Words
not any of my
Words
mean anything not even the noise they produce
not like Mingus’ fingers talkin’ on that bass.

i see Charles Mingus crying like cool jazz.
i see Lauren's head in my lap.
i see The Stranger spin on the turntable.
i see a broken night.
i see haze high near the ceiling.
i see headphone cords, whose ends hurt my ears.
i see the same chord progressions driving me mad.
i see love fading in a passerby's eyes.
i see chapped lips.
i see my debit card, i run it as credit.
i see the 10 foot tall stack of paperwork on my desk.
i see my know-it-all confidence.
I see my god complex.
I see your god complex, and know mine is greater.
i see ***, smell it, hear it, taste it, feel it, want it.
i see cars stampeding towards me down the hill.
i see neon signs for strip clubs.
i see prophetic signs, i ignore them.
i see my professor's approval.
i see computer screens.
i see my finger reject the call from a former fling.
i see ****** music.
i see sad faces, day after day.
i see my mind disconnected from my body.
i see boys in fraternities.
i see girls in barely anything at all.
i see my roommates and i yell for no reason--- we laugh.
i see society coming to eat me alive.
i see when i trip.
i see when i get up.
i see when i don't.
i see when i let my friends down.
i see when i pick them up.
i see my eyes closed.
i don't see what they want from me.