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Poets within this community of writers are feeling this moment in time, and writing about it.
Here are two more examples.
If you have something you want to say about what is happening in the world and how it may be affecting you in the way of a poem, and would like to have it considered for this series, drop me an email with a subject heading “poems written in the midst of our times.”
Joe Maita
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Causing to Become, A Rendering
hope in a torchbearer’s flame is subsiding
quivering before extinction
her fueled source surrendered
by dissatisfied men who do not distinguish
a difference between the vulgar and the vain
men regarding themselves
…………………………………………above others
who go after those
…………………………………………having been
…………………………………………having raised
…………………………………………having served
…………………………………………having paid
and because we are who we are
and what we have initiated
only one declared decision was needed
to dismiss this bearer of her distinct nobility
her entry invitation once enduring
her history to inspire
to engage
and compel her
to become a mere metal prop
another snag in the harbor to avoid
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by Terrance Underwood
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Somewhere Revisited
A lover from
a red hat family embracing
a lover serving
tacos any town USA
will always yearn for Somewhere,
a place of belonging
a West Side Story dance
to the prospect edge
of MLK’s mountaintop
where DEI isn’t disparaged
and the Montagues and Capulets
finally sit and
feast at one table.
Though wait:
is the exaltation
of some place and time
a “where” to be found only in the dream
of its existence? If it can be dreamt
can a residence be built on the wide mountain top?
Are embracing arms enough to sheath the dagger
as children of darkness fear for decrees
that will deport their loving hearts desire?
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by Daniel Warren Brown
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Listen to the 1961 recording of Leonard Bernstein’s composition “Somewhere,” from West Side Story [Masterworks Broadway]
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Daniel Warren Brown has loved jazz (and music in general) ever since he delved into his parents’ 78 collection as a child. He is a retired special education teacher who began writing as a senior. He always appreciates being published in journals and anthologies. At age 72 he published his first collection Family Portraits in Verse and Other Illustrated Poems through Epigraph Books, Rhinebeck, NY. Daniel writes daily about music, art and whatever else catches his imagination.
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Terrance Underwood is a retired Gas Turbine Package Engineer whose career offered opportunities to work all over the world. A devoted jazz enthusiast, his first memory operating a mechanical devise was a 4-speed spindle drop record changer for his father’s collection of 78s. In 2024, he was nominated by Jerry Jazz Musician for a Pushcart Prize.
Click here to read Proceeding From Behind: A collection of poems grounded in the rhythmic, relating to the remarkable, by Terrance Underwood
Click here to read his collection of poems “With Ease in Mind”
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Click for:
A Letter From the Editor: On “The Weary Blues: Celebrating Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance”
Information about the book Kinds of Cool: An Interactive Collection of Jazz Poetry, Vol. II (featuring women poets)
More poetry on Jerry Jazz Musician
“Where the Music Wasn’t Allowed,” Jane McCarthy’s winning story in the 71st Jerry Jazz Musician Short Fiction Contest
More short fiction on Jerry Jazz Musician
Information about how to submit your poetry or short fiction
Subscribe to the (free) Jerry Jazz Musician quarterly newsletter
Helping to support the ongoing publication of Jerry Jazz Musician, and to keep it commercial-free (thank you!)
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Jerry Jazz Musician…human produced since 1999
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