FOUR SONGS

By Charles Plymell

1.Press "one" if you want to be right
Press "two" if you understand life
Press "dos" if you speak Spanish
Remain on hold if you want to commit suicide

2.For every unmatched star that
breeds and dies along its beads
there is a creature in the woods
there is the season of my ancestor
who found the ancient turtle
by the rocks along the Mohawk

3.Pete seat mate
has hat head on backwards
He becomes a sigh ballon
that jazzmen silence
when the uptake pump jumps
He struggles with a plug
and watches the fly fly away
As the shoreline struggles
against the pull, the
geometry of a solar journey
outlines the grizzly cracks
that crush against the sunrise

4.I've travelled around these states
like a migrant bird, a prehistoric
whooping crane just over the highway,
over again trying to keep its
brain light for flight

It can't affford the weight of memory
I'd trade my memory for flight
and jettison my files and bank
for a little riff like Charley Parker
a new song for not carrying the drag
an old refrain here or there
gospel thoughts gathered
like plantation cotten

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