Fields of Satchmo

Fields of Satchmo

The highway sparkles obsidian,

arrowhead shavings,

cities named for the slaughtered,

a country built on crushed culture.

Our Fathers, coffeehouse Athenians,

half their fortunes pressed from

negro flesh so they wrote a

government full of wishes

Filled in the blanks with six hundred

thousand dead soldiers then told

the vanquished they could

go on lynching niggers so

long as they were free niggers.

Dangling bodies spoil a

proper party so we paper the

walls with righteous fictions.

Jazz, for example, as a

pure African form.

Explain the pianoforte, the

Turkish cymbal, the Spanish guitar.

Treble clefs running in

great herds along the Serengeti,

grazing on quarter notes.

If you are going to

survive the American mindfuck you

must embrace the awfulness,

fall face-down in the cattleshit,

open your eyes to find

Louis Armstrong sprouting like a

sunflower, sowing the plains with

peals of brass, smiling a

smile that no one forgets.

Child of slaves.

Handel’s trumpet.

Four-four time with tribal improv,

lyrics by Gershwin,

a swung note at the

tip of Jefferson’s pen.

From Michael J. Vaughn: Collected Poems

Notes: A good example of the poem as absurd compression (the entire history of slavery America in seven stanzas). Also, an effort to get through all the BS and call the good and bad for what it is. If poetry isn't about an effort to get to the truth of things, it's worthless. I suspect the urge to write this poem came from my recent promotion to great uncle of two lovely kiddies with African roots. American flag sculpture by Greg Hill.