Month: Dec 2020

Mothers & Daughters

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

Blood is only as thick as the cake mix added and stirred with it. You can put blood in the spotlight but it won’t dance on command. The blood howls. Its lashes out. It bites. Its unruly. The splatter is our history. Maybe blood will not reconcile with blood. Maybe they will find sacred ground and tread lightly around the pain. At a distance they might greet cordially and in their small talk they might reveal things they will not explicitly say about how they feel. That cake mix is not going to hold together the fragility and mistrust. Time won’t cast lots and aspersions to see who surrenders a position of advantage on a Chess board. But a thousand words in a photograph knows all too well that it won’t matter in the end. Who was right? Who was wrong? Did she hold you firm? Did she kiss your cheek? Did she brush your hair as your helpless torso rested on her lap? Did she watch you crawl to her when she returned from work to a cold appartment shared with hangers on? An abode of drifters taking refuge with a half wanted child and a mother who stayed the course, when the river pulled at her hem. Mothers and daughters and the waters between them….

Painting by Piyali Muni

Miles

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

A complex beast is the capacity to make music that is more humane than we can sometimes be to each other. The horn plays the player as much as the player plays the horn. Francis might have been the miles of music he heard after she was gone. Do we always hurt the ones we love the most? And did that thought ever cross his mind?

Here in this candid moment we project the idea of him that is safest for us to hold. The totality of a life is not safe to hold. We are dangerous terrain and our journey to meet each other might be on an unpaved road. The sign says I Dare You. Travelling miles alongside you to discover a fraction of the universe that you are, is several lifetimes we will never live. But you can play Blue In Green. It will tell you something. Maybe enough to go down that unpaved road of the lover you uncoiled for.

Light

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

Perhaps the light knew something I didn’t before I walked into studio C without a plan. Just loose ideas and the accumulation of years lived. The life I’ve been privileged to endure and delight in, tells on itself on such occasions as this one. Both sides of a coin put in a bid for what my heart subconsciously knows. I’m still learning to speak an old language.

Cello

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

Your mind drinks the sound of rain. Nurtures peace. Paints possibilities. Come take your bow and find your sweet music in me. Play your song as tender as a mother’s embrace. I won’t leave you for treasures of Gold. We are bound as one. Night and brown. Round in tone. We chase dreams for fun. And when I hear your voice speak through the hollow of my body, it resonates in the realm of the unseen. A language for healing hurts. We escape into the melody. A step ahead of the drift but not too far behind the beat. The tempo of my heart quickens when I see you smile in C sharp. Your joy dances across the strings that keep me sane. 

In a world of sand papered expressionists. Of clowns with crooked faces, and shiny knights made of Marzipan wishes come true, I find you in those quiet moments when the noise of grown ups fades into the shadows with your tears. I’ll never leave you for Emerald and Sapphire.

Play me again when I’m old and despised. I’ll be in the hollow waiting for you to release me from the indigo silence, that we might travel once more into new colours unimagined. Brighter than we ever sounded before. Lighter than the weight of careless words aimed at us. Stronger than fear’s hope to bring us down below the groove of love. Not for Ruby and Amethyst

Play me

Not for Diamond and……

Play me

Lady Luck

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

Lady luck rides the train, we’ll meet on the overground, an octave below the humming that signals a new day. Arise with expectations to make new chapters with crayons and chalk.

Cheapest words are spent on most precious things, food for your thoughts is washed down with red wine for your fears.

Her imagined lover mutes his tongue and silence screams his adoration, even the trees hear his sighs and cover their ears, too loud and violent, a howling in the sly and murky wind. Long may she reign, a Queen of hearts who played the hands of time and chance.

Elders

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

Elders count off years shaved by the blade. How quickly we forget the weight of days past tence. Mourn as you eat from the plate of good fortune.

I slept through more lifetimes than bodies, the nights wore me out. Single bedded mind on kingsize dreams, I was old before I was young. Too young to know I was rich in experience while I was earning my inches of growing pains. Lesson and class were taught in separate rooms, now life rents my living space.

Neck

Posted on by Napoleon Dozier

Neck turns the head but the heart anchors down by the habour of time. Fortified walls have felt the fury of arrows with intent, to learn of flesh pierced by desire. So ancient, a love that captures futures for you. Kingdoms of dust blown away, I wait for the arrival of your shadow to light up my eyes.