The Sunday Poem: “Straight, No Chaser” by Steve Trenam
When he entered a club ‘round midnight,
all 88 keys would break into a grin
and the stool would slide out from under
to invite him to sit down and play.
September 28th, 2024
The Sunday Poem
The Sunday Poem: “Down Jazz” by Holly Peppe
Prisms resound, glow dissonant—
refracted word-dyes salvaged from malaise.
A bleeding swatch of rainbow,
cordless stains on muslin,
stacks of frightened tightropes,
my slippers thin and worn –
September 21st, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Big Phat Jazz Police” by Charles Joseph Albert
When that first rumbling bass line
Tells me I’m listening to Gordon Goodwin’s
Big Phat Band playing “Jazz Police,”
I can’t help it, I always see an LAPD squad car
swinging out of the station
flipping on that groovy trumpet siren
as they join a pursuit with the whole horn section.
September 14th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “If Requests Are Being Taken” by Terrance Underwood
If ever
I am subjected to
Further medical exploration
& something
Identified as Bio
Is discovered
September 7th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Playing Sonny Rollins Loud in the Car” by Daniel W. Brown
Hurrying to a dental appointment
I didn’t want to go to in the first place
an interminable red light and honking traffic
and the curve where people merge
20 MPH faster than necessary
four lanes into two
not a good day overall
though Sonny Rollins is playing loud;
August 31st, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Stompin’ at the Savoy” by DH Jenkins
Sheets of music laid across a checkered table cloth
spread out like streets across the city.
Like the quarter notes on page one, a crescent moon
is seen rising in the ink dark sky.
August 24th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “somewhere near the major-minor seventh” by j. lewis
cohen says there are major falls
and minor lifts that come before
the fourths and fifths and i suppose
he’s probably right, most likely right
but this is not about some hallelujah
August 17th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Weary Blues” by David Rudd
Woke up this morning to the Bugle Call Rag,
Straight no chasers made my head real bad.
Nothing left for breakfast … goodbye pork pie hat,
Dressed with chilies (ah um) – never hotter than that!
August 10th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Spinning Black Platters” by Mike Jurkovic
During a brief respite from the hard rain,
I heard a music born of spring and sunsets
coming from spinning black platters.
Their weighty cadence, their spry
crackling fireworks
August 3rd, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Why Provincetown Gulls Sing Jazz” by Mike Mignano
On the Cape in P-town
August ‘55
Billie, Eartha, Ella vocals
Filled shoreline evening skies
Entrancing soaring seagulls
With jazzy siren song
July 27th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Why I Play Guitar” by C.J. Trotter
because Jupiter is 1300 times the volume of the Earth
because milkweeds in the yard are as beautiful as
“Hushabye”
because on clear nights the moon pours in my window
like a spotlight and makes me think
.Paul Simon’s in the room
July 20th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Ten-Suite Epistrophies and Improvisations: for T. Monk” by Bill Siegel
When he plays he wears invisible glasses
picks his keys with patience and purpose
a tornado with time on his hands
while in walks light
July 13th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “When Sonny Gets Gray” by John Menaghan
Surely Sonny still gets blue at times
I mean he’s a human being after all
isn’t he although sometimes he
seems more superhuman celestial
take now for instance as he bends
nearly all the way to the stage in
his 80s and plays and plays
and plays and plays and plays
July 6th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “By Ear” by Edward A. Dougherty
Stripped down standards
ache the air. Keith Jarrett
with chronic fatigue
recorded “I Got It Bad
(And That Ain’t Good)”
in sessions so short
he sometimes ended
before the song.
June 29th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Wrong Address” – by DB Jonas
Mingus flipped the kitchen switch,
flooding the room with light,
just as, seeking purchase in the slippery sink,
I tumbled through the unlocked window.
June 22nd, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “The Lady Sings” by Michael Keshigian
He often remembered
how it used to be with her,
his former lover,
who would sing him a song
every night before bed
then teach him each line
June 8th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Fast Girl” – by Allison Whittenberg
Entertain us, entertain us all
Give, give, give with your sassy voice, your young body
Despite the migraines…
At 11, on a North Philly street, gang raped
By three creeps
It starts there, the cracks
The headache
June 1st, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “You Never Forget Your First” – by Brian Kates
My high school girlfriend’s older brother
lived in a garret in the Village, like something
out of La Boheme, and she said maybe if we
went there, he’d leave us alone and we could
…well, you know
May 25th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Crossing Over” by CJ Muchhala
She was four, just waking to the world.
Aware of rain and blue air, of singsong words,
of a low trill as she drifted into night. Abruptly
she was lifted
into unfamiliar voices
May 19th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Mother’s Day Brunch” by Russell duPont
We’ll have a little brunch for you —
pecan-crusted French toast,
oysters, smoked salmon,
a charcuterie board.
May 11th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “The Divine Comedy as a Jazz Piece” by Matthew Johnson
I was preparing to make my exit from Heaven back to Earth,
And it was late March, so the lounge had transitioned
To their hot jazz band after playing the cool for months.
May 4th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “A Mountain Pass (In memory of Joe Pass)” by Bhuwan Thapaliya
A woman sits in a window frame
of old carved birds, listening to her
grandson in his jeans playing fig leaf music
in her home in Koshidekha,
a village in Nepal.
April 27th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Brown Girl” by Jerrice J. Baptiste
You punched him in his chin
Jimmy not her kin
can’t let a bully
do her in.
April 21st, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Lady Day and Prez” by Henry Wolstat
At the bar of the
Towne Tavern, once
Toronto’s finest jazz club,
stage facing me,
sipping my one beer,
knowing even then
in my twenty-third year
I was witness to
a never forgotten gig.
April 13th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Front Row Seat For A Head-Bebopping Allergy Sufferer” by Francis Fernandes
The pollen is flying like mad –
frantic, crazy, amorphously Daliesque –
sort of like our trio the other day,
rollicking and lollygagging through Monk’s
Brilliant Corners, losing it so completely
that when Marty flung a stick at my head
April 6th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Thelonious Monk’s Hat” by Gary Jude
washes up
on the keyboard.
Bill Evans’ glasses too.
I put Monk’s hat on
and suddenly feel
like the captain of a ship.
March 30th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Soultrane” by George Held
Soultrane came out when Ike governed.
1958. Before our nation
Would build up its war machine to invade
Viet Nam, training its Green Berets
March 23rd, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “A Jazz Drinker” by Ermira Mitre Kokomani
My friend is a Blues singer,
I am a Jazz drinker,
boozing shots after shots,
I never get drunk with Jazz.
March 16th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Watermelon Man” by Charles Albert
I admit I’d never heard of “Watermelon Man” before Harry Reid came to my kids’ elementary school to put together a concert band. He wasn’t a salaried teacher, but a part-time outsider brought in by the PTA.
...March 10th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Footprints to Infinity” by Michael Amitin
gentle the footprints go
up through the wilderness
to the heart-shaped night
short of breath, shorter, inches away on my speakers
miles inside
a sphere of glad- sad melancholy, dark tree twilights
March 2nd, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “The Eye Tapes…Monument to my Jazzy Eye” by Anita Lerek
Evergreens and pink lawn
chairs sang through my windowpane
until silenced by grime
and retinal leakage.
I pass my good eye
back and forth;
February 24th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Style” by Laurie Kuntz
Your father and I admonished you
for walking ahead on the craggy mountain ridge.
You defended your eager steps,
saying you were musing
on the musical styles
of Mingus, Parker, and Shorter,
February 17th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Bourbon Street” by Jianqing Zheng
Morning is dream time—
inns, strip clubs, and shops
are all eye-closed,
a hobo huddles
under a gray blanket
at a storefront,
neon signs illuminating
the strip all night long
February 10th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Nina & Maria Esther” by Juan Mobili
Both of them put up with fools
until they didn’t
and the sea that men parted
collapsed under their stares.
February 3rd, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Black Life” by Erren Kelly
shouts and dances in church
and thumbs its nose at shame
covers its body in brand names
and doesn’t worry about the future
holds hands and kiss shameslessly
in public; they call it p.d.a
January 28th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Fly Me To The Moon” by Chuck Sweetman
Take tonight, for instance.
I can’t ask you for the moon
the way Sinatra commands it
with his first-class confidence.
Let alone Jupiter or Mars.
January 21st, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Dorothy Donegan: Queen of the Keys” – by Connie Johnson
Sensational
Largely unsung
Dorothy Donegan
Known by jazz insiders as
The female Art Tatum
His protégé
The one who made him say:
“She is the only woman who can
Make me practice.”
January 14th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “Not Shelling Fava Beans With Alice Waters” by John Briscoe
I jammed
with the Afro-American Jazz Band
in the old Off Plaza on McAllister,
and with the blind Black pianist whose name I can’t remember
in the club we knew as The Question Mark
whose sign on Haight Street was just a neon ?,
when the club was straight and featured jazz
January 7th, 2024
The Sunday Poem: “A Poem About Art” by Geer Austin
Your chair is a kitten chasing a bird.
Hans Brinker skates across
your living room.
December 31st, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “That’s What I Want For Christmas” by Jerrice J. Baptiste
Each year offered
a little blue box.
Trinket from a window.
December 24th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Leap of Faith,” by Steve Trenam
I take my daughter to the ballet studio
at a former convent in Marin.
She will be dancing for hours.
At the edge of the church’s property
is an old gymnasium.
December 17th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Lady Day” by Millicent Borges Accardi
Her first note wails amber
smoke near overhead pipes above
the guitars. It wavers
and rolls r’s better than spring.
December 10th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Miles” by Charlie Brice
Yours is the sound of smoke
I love to inhale
the sound of a humid
summer night
its cool breeze
December 3rd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Queen” by Emily Jon Tobias
Mamacita
with round brown
hips
roll and sway
sway and roll
slow that stroll
she sings
to ease
her sticky soul
November 26th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “How I Achieved Levitation” by Bryan Franco
. . The Sunday Poem is published weekly, and strives to include the poet reading their work. Bryan Franco reads his poem at its conclusion. . . ___ . . . . How I Achieved Levitation They all lived in the Walnut Building. Satchmo blew the roof off the house. Fats Waller tickled ivories. … Continue reading “The Sunday Poem: “How I Achieved Levitation” by Bryan Franco”
...November 19th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Kirk’s Works” by Catherine Lee
Hearing Rahsaan Roland Kirk recordings
you could likely miss
the pleasure of that reedman’s kisser,
import of his so unique technique.
November 12th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Behind the Smile (for Satchmo)” by Antoinette F. Winstead
The Young Turk disregarded the old trumpeter
labeled him a vaudevillian minstrel
because he shucked and grinned,
having no privy to old man’s roiling anger within
fueled by slights and shames endured for years
despite his lauded, storied career.
November 5th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Love & Monk,” by Carrie Magness Radna
La La Love,
even when the cold raindrops
pounded against the window,
we snuggled close like fuzzy cats,
purring with Thelonious Monk
as we drank our Guinness.
October 29th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Vibrations” by Victor Enns
My eyes were faster dreaming
a drum kit in bed with me
Rapid Eye Movement Disorder
disturbing my sleep and my wife
moving away with her cellphone
camera watch my arms begin to move
October 22nd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “I Blame Chet Baker” by Lauren Loya
I blame Chet Baker
For opening a window into my past
Sensing that phantom trumpet in my capable hands
The smooth curves of the hard brass, the cold
Mouthpiece against my buzzing lips
Bright melodies blaring
From carefree days of my youth
October 15th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Blues For Archie Shepp” by Joe Kidd
Ce soir l’anniversaire
we defeat the oppressor
with our horns, our magic
here to bury us or set us free
October 8th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Fledging” by John L. Stanizzi
The woodshed was the hunting ground for wings of notes.
Black suits and ties, hipster hats and smoke rings of notes.
Was Robert Johnson alone, hellhound on his trail?
Was a deal made? Was Bird Satan’s plaything of notes.
October 1st, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Dink’s Blues and drum fills,” by Joel Glickman
I’m whistling a tune about
a woman’s broken heart,
down a long and empty
hallway, just to hear it
move itself along,
September 24th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Erroll Garner at the Ace” by Kristofer Collins
From a third floor window I imagine
I can almost see the cracked black
& white tile welcoming Penn Avenue
to the long-closed Kappel’s Jewelers.
September 17th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Musical Invocation” by Kathryn MacDonald
Strains of Charlie Parker’s alto sax fill
the empty apartment song-after-song –
“Dancing in the Dark,” “Loverman,”
“Embraceable You.”
Between every note I wish.
September 10th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “The Church of St. John Coltrane” by Mark Fogarty
Coltrane said a prayer to his musical God
Straight through the horn of his saxophone.
Not a metaphor; he spoke the words
Through the reed and the music into the air.
September 3rd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Sticks and Stones” by Laura Trigg
The shadow from the brick facade
of Central High School did not seem
to spread much shade on the streets
of our Little Rock neighborhood.
August 27th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Doxy” by Molly Larson Cook
once said I’d marry a man
Who could hum the first four bars
Of Cal Tjader’s “Doxy.”
We say these foolish things
When we’re young and
Still learning the ways of the world.
August 20th, 2023
The Sunday Poem “Po’ Monkey’s Juke Joint: Merigold, Mississippi” by Marianne Peel
Shrouded in smoke and cigarette spheres
Jazzy speakeasy on a summer slog of a night
Where hips ramble in tandem,
Slide and slip in an out of rhythm
Juke Joint shifting with an uneven floor
Naked feet shuffling and colliding
August 13th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Blue Ash” by Sean Howard
free
what
bars?
intra-
views,
posit-
ions
o-
pen.
August 6th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Being Smooth, Jazz, and Chill” by Christopher D. Sims
Smooth. Jazz. Chill.
Write. Think. Build.
Listen. Vibe. Poetically
design.
Spend time with jazzy
sounds elevating the
mind. Jazz is smooth.
Jazz is chill.
July 30th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Village” by Michel Krug
The light aspires to be equatorial
but each eroded moment quiets otherwise.
The twilight Superior shore fills
with pine smoke from fire pits
just as Coltrane played in the
smoldering light at the Village Vanguard.
July 23rd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “You Must Live It” by Byron Beynon
During that electric dawn
when I first heard
a bracelet of notes
which traced a subtle rhythm
within an hourglass of music
and sharpened the silence with sound,
July 16th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Cobalt Blue Mood” by Amy Barone
It’s one of those moments.
She only has ears for Miles Davis.
Reflecting on things that never came to be—
July 9th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Unsettled” by Roger Singer
he was/
a flightless bird/
bright as sky/
full of natural lies/
and sweet conflict/
when speaking the/
jazz
July 2nd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “I Hear Music in the Kitchen” by Sandra Rivers-Gill
Naturally, his lyrics are cued a cappella./“I’m home” slips from his lips,/sizzles like the taste of what I’m baking in the oven,/as he unwinds his day.
...June 25th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Duke Ellington’s Big-Band Orchestra: Live at Basin Street East, New York City. Summer 1964” – by Alan and Arlan Yount
The poet Alan Yount and son Arlan write about a live 1964 performance by Duke Ellington and His Orchestra
...June 18th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: – “Late Sunday” by Josie Rozell
All damn day/
talk — talk — talk/
I told him, son/
why not fit those fingers/
down that damn gullet/
and make it a proper/
squawk squawk squawk —/
June 11th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “The Music of Surprise” by John Menaghan
The poet recalls a live performance he witnessed by the Timeless All Stars
...June 4th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “When the Water and Sand Dance” by D.R. James
When the water and sand dance, whence (whence?)/their music? What is that music? What /jazz, what syncopation surfs itself in?
...May 28th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “This Blue Funk” by Aurora M. Lewis
That feeling when everything makes you sad/Nothing you can think of would make you glad/No matter how hard you try to remove yourself/From this blue funk
...May 21st, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Jazz Within Me” by Jerrice Baptiste
. . The Sunday Poem is published weekly, and strives to include the poet reading their work. Ms. Baptiste reads her poem at its conclusion. . . ___ . . David Dellepiane, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons . . Jazz Within Me I like Jazz playing within me. ……………….Record that never skips. Since age sixteen, … Continue reading “The Sunday Poem: “Jazz Within Me” by Jerrice Baptiste”
...May 13th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “The Drop of the Needle” by Russell duPont
The poet describes the clear, crisp sound of listening to jazz music on vinyl
...May 7th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “I Thought About You” by Connie Johnson
The poet recalls an encounter with Carmen McRae at a Hollywood shoe store
...April 30th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Christian Scott Atunde Adjuah” by Erren Kelly
The poet writes about the depth of the trumpeter’s playing, and the connections to many of the great trumpeters before him
...April 23rd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Deja Vu” by Anna Wrobel
The poet reflects on loss, fate, remembrance, and hopefulness
...April 16th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Back to Jazz” by Arlene Corwin
The poet recalls her early-life friendship with the pianist/composer Dave Frishberg
...April 9th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Nina As In Nina Simone” by Arya F. Jenkins
This narrative poem is informed by quotes and stories in What Happened, Miss Simone? the 2015 Netflix biographical documentary about the singer/artist’s life and art
...April 2nd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Charles Mingus’s Memento*” by Sean Murphy
The poet profiles the larger-than-life figure of the legendary jazz bassist Charles Mingus
...March 26th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Return to Forever—Chick Corea” by DH Jenkins
The poet writes of youthful memories conjured up from listening to Chick Corea and Return to Forever’s 1973 album, “Light as a Feather.”
...March 19th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Birth Of The Blues” by Patricia Carragon
The poet writes about the origins of our personal blues, and how they can affect us…
...March 12th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Miss Janice Scroggins and Her 88 Keys,” by Emmett Wheatfall
The poet honors his friend, the late jazz pianist Janice Scroggins, and reads his poem while Ms. Scroggins accompanies him
...March 5th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “An Urban Symphony” — by Anthony Ward
The poet is inspired by John Coltrane’s 1961 recording, “Ole”
...February 26th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “A Trench Coat Deserves Better” – by Terrance Underwood
The poet suggests better music could have accompanied the final scene in the film “Casablanca”
...February 19th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Always Cool” – by Judith Vaughn
The poet recalls the impact of Chet Baker’s music on her late, earlier life friend
...February 12th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: – “Dig: Dag: Dug: While Digging the Scene” by Namaya
Meanwhile, digging
the scene
a sultry
walking hip-step
bop that
fell to the
sweetest
moody!
...February 5th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “First Light (After Freddie Hubbard)” by Jessica Lee McMillan
first light skims on green wing like sprouts strobing for ray
...January 29th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Wood Ticks on Fire: Cecil Taylor and the Forests of Sound that Plant Themselves in Us” – by George Kalamaras
The poet writes about the complexity of pianist Cecil Taylor’s music, and the liberation he feels from listening to it
...January 22nd, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “If I Were A Monarch Butterfly” – by Mary K. O’Melveny
The poet imagines being a monarch butterfly, inspired to movement by the music of Django Reinhardt
...January 15th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “Carla Bley” – by Dan Brown
The poet shares a memory of the jazz pianist Carla Bley
...January 8th, 2023
The Sunday Poem: “She Be” — by Prince A. McNally
The poet reveres the power and beauty and historical significance of Black women, and reads his poem
...January 1st, 2023
In This Issue
(featuring the art of Paul Lovering)
Interview
Publisher’s Notes
The Sunday Poem
Click here to read previous editions of The Sunday Poem
Essay
Feature
Interview
Short Fiction
Click here to read more short fiction published on Jerry Jazz Musician
Poetry
Feature
Playlist
Poetry
Book Excerpt
Interview
Short Fiction
Art
Essay
Trading Fours with Douglas Cole
In Memoriam
Book Excerpt
Click here to read more book excerpts published on Jerry Jazz Musician
Jazz History Quiz #175
Community
Contributing Writers
Coming Soon
Interview Archive
