Copyright © 2018 by Lenard D. Moore

      ISBN: 9781949467307

      Library of Congress Control Number:2019957039

      2020 BLAIR reprint of collection originally published by

      Mountains & Rivers Press

      in 2018

       To all Jazz Artists,Jazz Historians,Jazz Critics,Jazz Teachers,and Poets

       for broadening our appreciation of Jazz and enriching our human condition

       Contents

       Swinging Cool

       Raleigh Jazz Festival, 1986

       Tanka Note

       Cookin’

       Girl Tap Dancing

       Sunday Evening

       No Reply

       Zora Shango

       Ray Charles Accepts Honorary Degree

       How Rhythm Bends River-Like

       Greenbriar Mall, East Point

       Reading the Black Poets

       Alchemy of New Orleans & San Francisco

       After Hours Jook Joint

       Barwell Road

       Thursday Night

       Mesmerized

       Jazz Suite

       Dizzy Gillespie Plays at the Jazz Hall

       A Note on Improvisations

       Wednesday Night at the Renaissance Hotel

       The Idea of Elegance

       Hudson Valley Writers’ Center

       American Jazzku

       Quartet at Smoke

       Lenox Lounge

       At Duke Chapel

       Inherit the Light

       Carolina Miles

       Eros and Jazz

       Cassandra Swings Back

       Nneena Freelon in Raleigh

       The Literary Salon

       Intermission, 1956

       Spillways

       Lovebeat

       Echoes of Sarah’s Words

       Songbird

       The Blue Room

       At the Train Stop

       Max Roach Speaks to an Audiophile

       Nina Simone Speaks to a Connoisseur

       Ascension: John Coltrane

       Interlude

       New Orleans Suite

      Acknowledgments

      Grateful appreciation is offered to the editors and publishers of the following publications in which some of these poems (in different versions) have previously appeared or are forthcoming:

      Chautauqua: "Swinging Cool." Reprinted by permission of Chautauqua. Copyright 2014, Lenard D. Moore.

      Black American Literature Forum (now, African American Review): "Raleigh Jazz Festival, 1986."

      Raleigh: A Guide to North Carolina’s Capital, 2nd Edition (The Raleigh Fine Arts Society, 1992): "Raleigh Jazz Festival, 1986."

      Word and Witness: 100 Years of North Carolina Poetry (Carolina Academic Press, 1999): "Raleigh Jazz Festival, 1986."

      Kola: A Black Literary Magazine (Canada): "Raleigh Jazz Festival, 1986."

      NCArts Journal, Volume 15 Number 2 Winter 2001 (North Carolina Arts Council): "Raleigh Jazz Festival, 1986."

      Fives: