The Second Set: The Jazz Poetry Anthology

Following up their wonderful jazz poetry anthology, editors Sascha Feinstein and Yusuf Komunyakaa deliver the goods again. Derek Walcott, June Jordan, and Gwendolyn Brooks all weigh in with fine poems, but my favorite this go-round is Rita Dove’s “Canary,” which includes these “Billie Holiday’s burned voice / had as many shadows as lights, / a mournful candelabra against a sleek piano, / the gardenia her signature under that ruined face.” These images tell a lot of the story of jazz as an art form. Life is painful, but music is solace, catharsis, and transcendence. So is poetry.