Kind of Blue

A Poem by Kev Bickerdike

Tribute to The Miles Davis album, particularly John Coltrane's saxophone solos.

Lachrymose piano, the minor ninth chord resonates;
the exact same frequency as despair.
Elfin fingers glide across delicate arpeggios,
while the ride cymbal casts drizzle upon the pavement of my internal city street.
A fragile trumpet line blows, sustaining tone and tension;
watched and held high by the ponderous twang of measured bass.
This sense of musical rumination is broken, with the entry of the tenor sax.
Oneiric tones, smoother than the moist glass the waitress places in front of me.
As my stomach warms to the gin infused brew,
the tenor man reaches beyond the band to converse with his muse.
Eyes closed, tight and straining;
his body rocks like a man wrestling a marlin.
Legato flourishes signify the heights he reaches.
Dizzying runs of two and three octaves blur his digits,
and the abstraction he coaxes from the valves and keys culminates
in primal screams, wrenched from the horn held high above his waist.
As the final note resonates from stage to audience,
the tenor man slowly opens his lids and steps backwards, breathing deeply;
the cymbals and bass easing him back into the groove.
the piano once again paints sheets of regret upon the stage,
while the trumpet recapitulates the melody
in that post-coital lull.