I had to feel his brass body while no one was looking.

The electric shock I felt from my fingers to my heart

matched the passions I heard from this sax so many times.

             Across from him was Monk, but they sold his piano for one of his records—so I couldn’t

             bounce on his keys, sadly. But the way Nina Simone swaddled the pearls around her neck

             so soft, so cool, reminded me how I should feel (birds flying high, you know).

I’d like to add all this to that list next to those raindrops, whiskers,

 

             brown pa                                   per       pack aaaage                eee                           ss

                                                    tied up

             with                 strii        ii                       iings.

​

When I drove home, I put on that album.

Oh, wait. He played the soprano. Where is that?