It's not Zen
but it is mindful,
two-handed tapping
(on one fret board)
And not just fretful
showmanship
(even two hands on
two guitars or simul-
taneous piano & guitar)
A full spectrum sound
—happy, jaunting along
crisp & full of natural
dë-light
We learn this guy is
environmentally-friendly
& practitioner of
music therapy
We hear that too—
a sweetness,
conscientiously yours
Another Mr. Popularity
(& for good reason)
Profoundly sad &
sweet
alternating
joyous & sweet
(ad infinitum...)
Nice & easy
Easy is nice, too
Warm summer evenings
windows rolled down
Meth (lite) cranked up
Ride us to the town
called love
(it's in the pink)
No tip, you know
better than that
The pleasure was always
both of ours
And don't wait outside,
we'll be up late
listening to it all
bleach out
white silence
Highly produced, yes
(Mr. Popularity, &
for good reason)
from bebop through hard bop, cool, third
stream, modal, funk, fusion, and doo bop
Richard Stevenson
Just repeating ourselves:
Genius is a word
to be respected
(here)
We started so very
long ago kind
of blue
But it really started
with the cool, pure
tones sketched in
Spain
Nothing wasted
nothing left of that
freakish, frenetic
cartoonish
bop
—bebop to freebop
to "minimalist"
playing around
in a silent
milky way
Record by record
tracking toward that
fuse thing you do
(your discursive
period)
Exquisite interjections
into blank space
That full round tone
& sound bites
that can break
the heart in
every
single
groove
Stephen Bett has had eleven books of poetry published: Track This: a book of relationship (BlazeVOX Books, Buffalo, N.Y., 2010); S PLIT (Ekstasis Editions, 2009); Extreme Positions: the soft-porn industry Exposed (Spuyten Duyvil Books, NYC, 2009); Sass 'n Pass (Ekstasis Editions, 2008); Three Women (Ekstasis Editions, 2006); Nota Bene Poems: A Journey (Ekstasis Editions, 2005); Trader Poets (Frog Hollow Press, 2003); High-Maintenance (Ekstasis Editions, 2003); High Design Refit (Greenboathouse Books, 2002); Cruise Control (Ekstasis Editions, 1996); Lucy Kent and other poems (Longspoon Press, 1983). He is a member of the English Department at Langara College in Vancouver.