Selected Poetry
Radicalized at the Both/And
After hearing Kirk pre Rahsaan jammin’
The Inflated Tear on Alameda’s KJAZ
I became a teenaged convert.
When I heard Monk was comin’ to town
I dialed up the Both/And on Divis
“Both/And” the gruff voice growled.
Me (excited): Is Thelonius Monk playin’ there tonight?, I squealed.
Gruff voice: He’s workin’ here tonight. Aint’ nobody playin’.
I winced
shrunk back into my Kelly Hill persona
and ain’t been the same since.
12/3/20
Bob Kaufman’s Autograph
waypast round midnight I’m up, rootin’ in this lexicon called life
while
the best kept secret that begat our ancestors trip
guides my lip that drips from my fingers here
give this mothafucka some cadence, will ya?
grant him legattos that linger longer, cuz like hendrix wrote
the story of life is quicker than the wink of an eye
the story of love is hello and goodbye...until we meet again
I met bob kaufman at berkeley’s rainbow sign
we were settin’ a record for continuous rhyme and poetic reason
he was king of the beats
had trod those mean north beach streets
the scourge of bad broadway beat cops
who happened to be italian
At the rainbow, it was like in walked bob
or rather he was led in on a leash by his handler spouse
at first a sad sight to see - the lights going out
in the retrospective view though
the leash tethered him to the earth he was trying to flee
what happened thence you have to believe was theatre of the spirit --
the mic was handed him and it turned golden,
before our eyes the poet morphed from toothless urchin of the street
to gifted oratorical shamen
hurling hyper eloquent utterances
that informed logic and truth .
he stunned us with his bop gun
whose bullets lifted us to where he was a goin’.
he signed my homemade chapbook afterward
continuing on his rarely noticed, solitary genius path,
even the infamous berkeley barb ignored his contribution
when describing the rainbow sign poetry marathon of July 1975
choosing to mention instead ferlinghetti joyce carol thomas & others
yeah Robert Darnell Kaufman forged ahead 11 more years
despite enduring 39 San Francisco arrests
electroshock therapy at bellevue
and a 10 year vow of silence at the peak of his creative powers
dying of emphysema and cirrhossis in 1986 at age 60
yeah,
he signed my homemade chapbook afterwards
it was my prized possesion till I lost it
or should I say gave it back to the universe - so I will end this
with a quote from the boat of the poet Bob Kaufman himself:
In this dark plastic jungle, land of long night, chilled.
My navel is a button to push, when I want inside out.
Am I not more than a mass of entrails and rough tissue,
must I break my bones? Drink my wine - diluted blood?
Should I dredge old sadness from my chest?
Not again,
All those ancient balls of fire, hotly swallowed, let them lie,
Let me spit breath mists of introspection, bits of me,
So that when I’m gone, I shall be in the air.
DON’T GRIEVE ME BABYLON (I stuck that in there!)
Poem On The Passing of Eddie Gale;
(A Jazz Father of the Sons of Bop)
Edward Gale Stevens, Jr. (1941-2020)
a brooklynite bopper to be of the geechee/gullah bloodline
the bugle called you from the cub scout climb
learned how to march, learned how to play
how to doowop, dance and blow in and out of the fray.
beholden of Jazz culture’s golden battlefield code
university of the bandstand became a chop-heavy load
you swung with cats only poets and mothers cannot forget
Sun Ra, Cecil Taylor, Larry Young, Trane and Jacquet
inner peace was your grease
a balm toward making all bombs cease
sonic elixir spewed forth from your horn of plentiful worth
the knell now sounds the dirge as you exit this earth
now we kneel and bemoan your precious ascension
to the gate of the heavenly convention
your children of bop still hear you Master Gale
as you join our ancestors to forever wail
© 2020 Thurman J. Watts
Poem For Stevie
we thought we had to grieve thee in '73
i almost died myself in that post-cointelpro season
six days after Inner Visions was released
on the road to the next gig
your life was almost erased
for four days God quieted your spirit
as angels fed you grace
when your power of speech returned
from what doctors called a coma
you spoke of the higher ground you visited
while gone from us
summarily, the car accident
was no accident
my god, steveland hardaway morris judkins, little stevie now wonder
the things we've viewed in your 70 revolutions
we are a witness in you jordan stream of consciousness;
brown v. the board of education--let's see, was that up
or down
a rosa parks frown as she sat down sparked us to get up,
stand up, STAND UP FOR OUR RIGHTS
but it seems we've forgotten the power of the boycott
BOY cotton pickin' ain't that far back
EMMETT TILL?
just for a kuh, kuh, kracker thrill
the little rock nine
crackin' the code of segregation
sheriff bull connor followed by jim clark's posse's
horses hooves
cracked our bones and bent our spines
but your spirit would not be moved
one nation under a what?
1957's civil rights act
allowing federal prosecution for voter suppression
what?
dese 'publicans still runnin' that ruse
'scuse me while i do the what? boogaloo?
dey bringin' that back too!
bombing babies in churches
we countered with the deacons for self defense
forerunners of the black panther party on the real
to this day the enemy burns churches and invades
bible studies with weapons concealed
we cyan't forget cia backed assassinations;
lumumba, malcolm, sam cooke, otis redding,
the dead kennedys, martin, mark clark,
fred hampton, li'l bobby hutton, jimi hendrix, john lennon,
bob marley, peter tosh
what do we really know about the sla
and who was patty tania the revolutionary hearst?
zebra check in san francisco
stop and frisk is a global phenomenon
the bombing of the move house in philly
the elevation of crack cocaine
helped along by raygun's henchman oliver north
neighborhoods were decimated while the potent drug
took out marvin, richard pryor, sly, huey, gil, and countless others
known and unknown
stevie, you've witnessed it al and through your songs
gave us the will to carry on
your fingertips reach a place in the sun for us
you reminded them that
this world was made for all men
and a holiday for king
you helped usher in
on blast you put the skeletons of slavery
even as we were living for the city
in this global village ghetto land
some of us remain bound by superstition
yet your clarion call compels us toward higher ground
heaven help us all
thus, we are bound to your inner vision
and though heaven is 10 zillion light years away
even now you must be writing a dirge for the dread covid
blast it master stevie
with your rocket love for the people of earth
blast it
happy birthday
to ya