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The prologues are over. It is a question, now,
Of final belief. So, say that final belief
Must be in a fiction. It is time to choose.

I

That obsolete fiction of the wide river in
An empty land; the gods that Boucher killed;
And the metal heroes that time granulates -
The philosophers' man alone still walks in dew,
Still by the sea-side mutters milky lines
Concerning an immaculate imagery.
If you say on the hautboy man is not enough,
Can never stand as a god, is ever wrong
In the end, however naked, tall, there is still
The impossible possible philosophers' man,
The man who has had the time to think enough,
The central man, the human globe, responsive
As a mirror with a voice, the man of glass,
Who in a million diamonds sums us up.

II

He is the transparence of the place in which
He is and in his poems we find peace.
He sets this peddler's pie and cries in summer,
The glass man, cold and numbered, dewily cries,
"Thou art not August unless I make thee so."
Clandestine steps upon imagined stairs
Climb through the night, because his cuckoos call.

III

One year, death and war prevented the jasmine scent
And the jasmine islands were ****** martyrdoms.
How was it then with the central man? Did we
Find peace? We found the sum of men. We found,
If we found the central evil, the central good.
We buried the fallen without jasmine crowns.
There was nothing he did not suffer, no; nor we.

It was not as if the jasmine ever returned.
But we and the diamond globe at last were one.
We had always been partly one. It was as we came
To see him, that we were wholly one, as we heard
Him chanting for those buried in their blood,
In the jasmine haunted forests, that we knew
The glass man, without external reference.
Tatiana  Dec 2012
Music
Tatiana Dec 2012
Sometimes I feel,
like I would die without my music.
The comfort
of my base drum's steady beat,
and the excitement of the snare drum
and symbols,
keeps me from being sad.

I remember,
when I first started to play the Oboe,
it was my new source of comfort,
something that I could always play,
and be happy,
along with my drums.
For years,
if you heard either the drums,
or the oboe,
coming from my room,
you knew not to enter.
I wanted to be alone,
and be absorbed into my music.

I got my own piano on year,
I would teach myself,
because I do not like it
when others force me to learn,
what can I say,
i'm stubborn.
I played the piano
everyday,
along with
the oboe, and
the drums.
Music was my happiness.

One day,
I became sad,
depressed almost.
I couldn't bring myself
to play my music.
My instruments just sat in my room,
untouched,
for weeks.
I couldn't bring myself
to play them,
at the time
it was easier to just lie
in my bed,
and do,
nothing.

But one morning,
i got up,
because I don't like,
the easy way out,
I was disgusted with myself
for taking that path.
Slowly, hesitantly I reached
for my oboe,
the instrument that I constantly
battled with.

I played part of a song,
that I learned years ago,
and I felt myself start to smile,
truly smile,
after weeks of fake smiling,
and pretending to be happy.

Sometimes the sadness,
can make the things you enjoyed doing,
into something you despise,
because it only held happy memories,
that will never occur again.
But they won't ever occur again,
because I was sad,
and not truly living.

But just the feel of playing my oboe,
made me understand
that things go wrong,
and sometimes you can't stop it,
but you must move on,
because if you don't
you will waste your life away,
becoming a shell
of your former self.
You'll die feeling alone,
in a dark room,
where you feel like
no one loves you,
even though that is not true.
I'm not really sure what happened, I just started thinking and typing, and this is the end result.
Serenity Elliot Oct 2014
Roly poly helicopter
Spinning and toppling on a splatter of pink liquid paint
The sharp sound of blackberries and the taste of an oboe
Under the neon night sky glinting with frozen lollipops
LD Goodwin Dec 2013
Puce fresnel washed its light on his over sized African patterned dashiki,
while paisley notes poured from his reeded dreams.
Like the Hamelin piper I was mesmerized by hypnotic tones,
every sweet and spicy slur, every bend of every breath,
I followed him down history’s path and heard the world come boldly through.

“You got to keep the magic”, was his advice .
“Don’t give away too much of the theme.”

Through fake fog he swirled his love,
his passion, his calling.
“Summertime”, played on an oboe
is like hot liquid southern summer ***.
It crawls up your spine and explodes in your brain,
and you understand the songs meaning without one word sung.
Hundreds of years of vassalage reenacted in every blue colored measure.

This man did not think of himself as a descendant of slavery though.
He was, like all of his brothers of color,
a descendant of great Princes and Kings,
stealthy Hunters and fearless Warriors,
grand Land Owners and Wise Men,
Great Leaders of Peace and Brotherhood,
and he lived out his life as they did,
changing the world one note at a time.
He played the music of all people,
“World Music” it later came to be known.

Listen….he is in the rhythm still.
Wherever there is an ethnicity holding on to their heritage in song.
Wherever there is an indigenous rhythm, a harmony, a feeling……
Yusef is there, and he will be there forever.


*Yesef Lateef
Born October 9, 1920 in Chattanooga, TN
Died December 23, 2013 Shutesburry, MA

Musician, author, spokesman, educator

Instruments: tenor saxophone, flute, oboe, bassoon, bamboo flute, shehnai, shofar, arghul, koto


Recalling a magical night at Stratton Mt.,Vermont, in the winter of 1975 when I opened for Yusef Lateef.
Knoxville, TN December 2013
Tatiana  Dec 2012
Oboe
Tatiana Dec 2012
Sweet lullabies,
float along the staff lines,
played by instrument,
that can croon sweet tones,
into ones ears.
But yet,
the same instrument
that can sing so softly,
and beautifully,
can be loud and obnoxious,
making the treble clef,
tremble with anger,
or fear.
This one instrument,
is so sweet, mysterious, and haunting,
but at the same time,
its loud, angry, and obnoxious.
It's unique,
just so beautiful,
and rare.
It's my perfect match.
I've played the Oboe for six years now, and I would never give it up. I used to take band in school but I quit because I disliked the class, even though the teachers really wanted me to stay. They would give me solos and important parts in songs, they told me how good I was at the Oboe. However, I don't think i'm as good as they think I am, but the Oboe is my musical match, there is nothing more unique than the Oboe and I still play the instrument everyday, I will never drop it.
Stu Harley Aug 2016
oh
what
joy
fantasy
and
sweet melody
breathe deep
through
my soul
at
heaven's gate
i hear
the
enchanted sound of
Gabrial's Oboe
radiating
street lamps
ionized the
indigo blue
haze charging
the night air

sparking the
city’s eclectic
currents coursing
through the
abandoned raceways
and empty streets

energizing the
phantoms of
the city’s
restive spirits

the ghosts of past
Great Falls Fests came
jitterbugging back
to life

transparent
veils lifting
and falling
with it, a voltaic
indigo blue
billowed out of the
abandoned stadium
pouring smoking
oboe moans
into the cavity
of the great gorge

“I was one of the last
to perform at
Hinchliffe Stadium”
Duke proclaimed
with his usual  
distinguished air

“it was also one of my
last concerts”, he added
with a tinge of
sorrow in his voice

“the band was rockin
the Art Deco tiles,
splintering and shattering
into bits of earth toned graffiti
the last vestiges of
a bygone Jazz Age
dissolving into the
disco fizz of the
Seventies”

the indigo mood
clamoured off
the rocks absorbing
the sonorous waves
like a stand of
hallowed
sequoias

“I’m trying to
remember what
my last tune
was that night.

was it Caravan?
or a Prelude to
a Kiss?  No no
too mellow
we always ended
on an upper
a real crowd pleaser,
I recall the boys swung
a medley before the grand finale
that medley included
Mood Indigo, Caravan,
Sophisticated Ladies,
Prelude to a Kiss.
We opened with Kinda Dukish
Rockin and Rhythm
we closed with
Satin Doll
Yes I’m quite sure
I waltzed them
off the floor
that night with
Satin Doll”

Duke ran his
fingers through
his processed hair.
He grabbed my shoulders
raised his baggy eyelids
And looked me straight
In the eye

“Yes, we followed
Tito Puente, he killed it
we upped our game
He was just starting out
But at this time Silk City
was going Caribe
Juan Tizol was
out of his mind that night,
I thought him and Babs
we're gunna jump ship
and join the Salsa Circus
Yeah El Rex and Celia Cruz
were that good

El Rex had the place
jumpin and jivin
it was a glimpse of the old days
livin in the here and now
just like the old days
I couldn't compete with that
so I waltzed them off
the floor with Satin Doll
a little cheek to cheek swoon
maybe some guys got lucky that night
and maybe some girls fell in love
Yeah Paterson was changing,
the ***** Leagues long gone
the last ****** Auto Races
crossed the final finish line weeks before
when the raceways in the stadium
replaced the raceways to the factories
we knew it was coming to an end
and with it all the good paying
jobs, whatta shame
just like me and the boys
watching El Rex
the Duke was dethroned by a King
just like Silk City
we had our day in the sun too
a Satin Doll Sun
Those were some good times,
sometimes”

Duke scratched
his head,
and he looked down into
the swirling noise
of the Great Falls
“on a night like this
the mood indigo
takes you into the
darkest hues of blues”

fragment from
Silk City PIT 6:
The Great Falls

Duke Ellington, Coleman Hawkins
Mood Indigo




Oakland
3/30/13
jbm

(FRAGMENT WORK IN PROGRESS)

Part 6 of extended poem Silk City PIT.  PIT is an acronym for Point In Time.  PIT is an annual census American cities conduct to count the homeless population.  Hope and Labor is the city motto of Paterson NJ, nick named The Silk City.
(FRAGMENT WORK IN PROGRESS)

Part 6 of extended poem Silk City PIT.  PIT is an acronym for Point In Time.  PIT is an annual census American cities conduct to count the homeless population.  Hope and Labor is the city motto of Paterson NJ, nick named The Silk City.
Robert C Howard May 2016
Sinbad’s sea-battered ship was
poised on the edge of annihilation,
The Sultan's brow furrowed with curiosity,
then without warning
Scheherazade stilled her narrative
and lived to see the morning sun.

When the moon and stars next owned the sky,
Sinbad was snatched from the jaws of death
then the saga of Prince Kalandar
seized the king's soul with wonder
but Scheherazade left the tale unfinished
and sang with the birds at dawn.

Rimsky-Korsakoff  turned the pages at his desk -
consumed by Scheherazade’s charms
then etched his pen across the waiting staves:
The violin must weave her spell once more
and bassoon and oboe take the prince’s part.

Trombone and trumpet led the martial call
and all the rest enlisted for the cause.
Russian bravura fused with the seductive allure
of exotic tunes born of the dust on the silken road.

A sonic whirlwind filled Saint Paul Church,
as winds and tremolos grew to cyclonic force.
A wall of brass completed Kalandar’s tale.
capped by an exuberant clash of cymbal plates.

The silence yielded to tender violins
chanting a hymn to the princess in all her grace.
Tambourine and winds wove a tapestry
of her debonaire and most virtuous prince.

As the final pizzicato chord faded, the Sultan
turned to Scheherazade with tear-filled eyes
and beheld his immortal princess
and she her valiant and eternal prince
and so it would be as long as night preceded dawn.

She kissed away his tears of joy and whispered in his ear,
“My beloved husband, I will tell you stories forever.
Tomorrow you shall learn of the Feast at Baghdad.”
Another site I have posted on, Poetfreak.com is shutting down so I am moving some the poems here. More refugees will follow.

— The End —