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This weekend is Jazz weekend in our village. We are all looking forward to the traditional show up the road tonight, but last night there was a pre-concert next to the "mairie".
For those of us who experience jazz in a yearly, bunfight in a field kind of way this was a whole new experience.
Jazz, I have discovered, is a whole new wardrobe compared to real life.
So, here's today's offering -
Jazz Fantasia by Carl Sandburg
Drum on your drums, batter on your banjoes,
sob on the long cool winding saxophones.
Go to it, O jazzmen.
Sling your knuckles on the bottoms of the happy
tin pans, let your trombones ooze, and go husha-
husha-hush with the slippery sand-paper.
Moan like an autumn wind high in the lonesome treetops,
moan soft like you wanted somebody terrible, cry like a
racing car slipping away from a motorcycle cop, bang-bang!
you jazzmen, bang altogether drums, traps, banjoes, horns,
tin cans — make two people fight on the top of a stairway
and scratch each other's eyes in a clinch tumbling down
the stairs.
Can the rough stuff . . . now a Mississippi steamboat pushes
up the night river with a hoo-hoo-hoo-oo . . . and the green
lanterns calling to the high soft stars . . . a red moon rides
on the humps of the low river hills . . . go to it, O jazzmen.
and here's my extra verse or so-
Put away those jeans, shun those converse,
Dig out the heels, caress that cashmere,
Smile those teeth, tinkle that laughter.
Find those friends, scoff that food,
Slurp that punch, chat that chat,
Tell those tales, shriek that laughter.
