The Sunday Poem: “Fledging” by John L. Stanizzi

October 1st, 2023

The Sunday Poem is published weekly, and strives to include the poet reading their work.

John L. Stanizzi reads his poem at its conclusion.

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photo by William Gottlieb/Library of Congress

Charlie Parker, c. 1947

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Fledging

“I realized by using the high notes of the chords as
a melodic line, and by the right harmonic progression,
I could play what I heard inside me.
That’s when I was born.”
-Charlie Parker

The woodshed was the hunting ground for wings of notes.
Black suits and ties, hipster hats and smoke rings of notes.

Was Robert Johnson alone, hellhound on his trail?
Was a deal made? Was Bird Satan’s plaything of notes.

The Bird myth summons indulgence, mental illness,
but the music is joyous; it’s all things of notes.

The healthy Bird whirled about our heads calling us
from Kansas City to the Ozarks; strings of notes.

But the caravan to the Ozarks had a crash.
Three broken ribs, a fractured spine – the King of notes.

They had travelled such a long distance for that wreck,
for that long pain, for that permanent wring of notes,
for that future collision where being strung out
meant avoiding shadows where death’s offspring of notes

have loomed, out in plain sight since the ages of want.
In New York crank careened in your brain; slings of notes

Relaxin’ at Camarillo was just a break;
booze ‘til your return when you would find limbs of notes.

Though we thought we might, we couldn’t pass through your pain,
bebop still hidden in Cherokee; hymns of notes.

Fifteen hours in the woodshed meant more than work.
It meant patience, secrets, and endless springs of notes.

Slowly Bird’s blazingly fast solos began to
erupt into chromatic magic – spins of notes.

The confines of the simpler jazz solos were razed;
he had been able to hear it, but not play it.

He needed higher intervals to find the tunes.
He could hear them but couldn’t play those spears of notes.

Then one night in a chili house in ’39,
his “birthday,” Bird came alive – a frontier of notes.

Through a stone wall of drugs and pain Bebop emerged,
and the moldy figs were given their ears of notes

Listen to John L. Stanizzi read his poem

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John L. Stanizzi has authored Ecstasy Among Ghosts, Sleepwalking, Dance Against the Wall, After the Bell, Hallelujah Time!, High Tide – Ebb Tide, Four Bits, Chants, Sundowning, and POND. Besides Jerry Jazz Musician, John’s poems have appeared in Prairie Schooner, Cortland Review, American Life in Poetry, and others. He’s been translated into Italian and appeared widely in Italy. He’s had nonfiction in Stone Coast Review, Ovunque Siamo, Literature and Belief, and others. John lives with his wife, Carol, in Connecticut.

Listen to the 1942 recording of Charlie Parker playing “Cherokee.” [Song Cast]