The rock of his fingers
scratches out, pounds out
the language of jazz,
spreading over fast hearts and
soft skin.
A wretched smile, crooked with time,
boiled in emotion soup,
spreads him out
as he releases the scars of
high and low,
winds of cold
and years
remembered with trouble.
His fingers swim
the streams of persuasion
as the crowd moves closer
with eyes to his throne
where a wave of sound
becomes captured
and then released
into the
black of his breath.
Roger Singer 