Improvisation #2: Charlie Parker Dies for Our Sins
- Improvisation #2: Charlie Parker Dies for Our Sins
exhale a blue dream and follow it up hear heaven sing back to you its majestic tone flatted a 1/4 step as it riffs your breath. don’t look down Hail Mary and Praise Jesus will not save you though a needle can prick the pain into a single sixteenth under your skin Thou shalt not wear brown skin boldly.Thou shalt not cry in laughing notes.Thou shalt not wallow in the bottom to reach the top. these songs will be a burning bush in your mouth the notes will buoy you up til you are spoonfeeding each vibration into God’s allergic ear. God himself will remind you that the wages of sin are death.
Paulette Beete has studied writing with Yusef Komunyakaa, Maureen Seaton, and Rohan Preston, and she has been involved in numerous workshops, most recently The Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Rhode Island. Paulette was the recipient of a 1998 CAAP grant from the City of Chicago. Her work has appeared in Rhino, and she is a founding member of “The Divas,” a Chicago-based collective of poets.
