roger singer | with song & warm nights & the up of release

WITH SONG

The notes rattled the chains in his head;
souls marching, singing the pain
of long days lost to labor
for another man’s dream.

Tears jaggedly cut his dusted cheeks,
coursing rivers equal with oceans once crossed,
added up and stacked onto the forever of years lost.

Dust and sand kick up from under
the shoes of the man who sings a
the jazz,
stirring the blood of rivers in
souls thirsty to forget.

WARM NIGHTS

He forces up shadows, chasing them
to the surface, exposing scars from battles
and wounds of loss
as he listens to the swirls of
whispers lift up from dust.

He holds the jazz.
The birth of the his pain pushes up sound
into the soup of faces,
flooding onto stained chalk painted sidewalks
where crowds slip his name into their stream.

Scarlet voices speak of escape.
A forest of eyes pulls at his roots.
Moist lips water the night as he kills off his past.

THE UP OF RELEASE

The music of her
is a ribbon untied;
streams of silk break
free like summer
stars on the foreheads
of angels.
I feel the thick of myself,
as if running under water.
I become trapped
in the listening
of the jazz;
like the first time it
blanketed me.
A rocking upside
down motion
in my head
breaks the bondage,
releasing me
as I lift my eyes
meadow wide
and arm opening
to the sweet talk
of music
pulling me up.