Jazz
Is As American As Apple Pie
All
across the country
Jazz musicians playing SOS
With your heart strings
Playing my nerve ends
Like a skilled violinist
Losing myself in sightless sound
Playing deep down from the gut
All the way to the ridge between
My toes
Telling a story, America’s story
Each note bathed in sweat and blood
Leaving you with those chalk scraping
Blackboard gut wrenching chills
Like old glory lying torn and tattered
At Ground Zero
Surviving, rising to be carried into the
Winter Olympics
Choked-up emotion wrapped
In an aura of invincibility
Homeless
He
stands in the rain
Searching garbage bins
For pieces of treasure
An edible, half finished sandwich
A piece of day old bread
Aluminum recyclable cans
He packs them in his shopping cart
His home on wheels
Limps off into the night
Talking to the cracks in the street