I am streaming some old Jazz (Mingus, Duke Ellington, The Modem Jazz Quartet)
From my phone via bluetooth
As I drive
To the store
When my brother Dave's ghost
chimes in:
It would sound better coming from a long play stereophonic record, he says.
No doubt, I tell him
Surprised that I am not surprised
That he is in the car with me.
We call it vinyl now, I tell him
I think he nods
Though I can't really see him.
You know, he says, it is all about the intervals and the timing.
We listen for a while, then he says :
Something nobody really understood about me
Is that I was a jazz improvisation
While I was alive.
I think, this makes no rational sense at all.
Though I don't say it outloud, my brother responds:
No, it isn't about being rational
It's about the intervals and timing.
And suddenly I understand him in a way I didn't when he was alive.
I love you, I say
But he's gone
Jumped to an unexpected note.
Unexpected
But perfect.