supernatural fire

                   By DB Cox

dim lights float

in cigarette smoke

a saxophone cuts

through the haze

like lightning

at sundown

screaming “fuck you”

to the sky

notes stumble chromatically

into impossible places

then somehow

slip out gracefully

a bebop poet

gone a little mad --

machine greased

with drugs & whiskey

to dull the edge

of feeling too much --

balanced on a ledge,

a terminal tightrope walker

lighting this murky space

with a supernatural fire

that burns for awhile

then goes cold

conjuring a vertigo

of living color

out of this black hole

of 3 a.m. sorrow

*   *   *   *   *

posted 11/12/04

DB Cox is Blues musician/poet, originally from South Carolina, now resides in Watertown, Massachusetts. He has had writing published on-line in: Verse Libre Quarterly, LauraHird.COM, Zygote In My Coffee, Remark, Underground Voices, Sacramento Poetry Art & Music, and others. His work has appeared in print in: Aesthetica, Circle Magazine, Shadow Poetry, My Favorite Bullet, Mystery Island Magazine and Open Wide Magazine.

He has played guitar since the age of 14. After graduating from high school in 1966, he did a 4 year stint with the U.S. Marines. After his discharge, he moved to Boston, Massachusetts to attend the Berklee School of Music, where he eventually found the blues circuit. He loves writing for the same reason he loves playing the guitar -- a way to communicate how he feels, at a given time, on a given day. donniebegood@comcast.net