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song for Oscar
a canary-yellow miner
rummages beneath the Rubin
for the molten core of music
light jumps from the stage
to the keys of his clarinet
then out into the crowd
like the fierce glare
of a headlamp
worn to stave off the dark
it’s a long trip from Tucson
to 17th Street, with a lot of
empty space along the way
miles of desert air filling
his lungs, breathed out
into the room like the
oncoming night that spills
into the bowl of mountains
around The Old Pueblo
there were a million reasons to stay
to become just another uncle
who unpacks his horn at the holidays
to the groans of the young ones
“just sit there while Uncle Oscar
plays a song” she would have said
but in a town with a dried-up river
he learned to swim against the stream
all the way to this refuge on the estuary
now on a Saturday night at Barbes
you’ll hear the brass banda smashing
through the walls, forcing
the dancers to take to the floor
spinning, laughing, weeping
with memory and ecstasy
beneath the black cowboy hat
is a brain that can pick its way
between the cracked stones
at the end of the sidewalk
where the music comes
in splinters and shards
/ / /
I’m a big fan of saxophonist and clarinetist Oscar Noriega and have wanted to write a poem about him for a while. When I learned that he’s from Tucson, a place very dear to me, this is what resulted. I’ve seen him in a number of contexts. The images in this poem come primarily from a recent show with Tim Berne and also from his band Banda Sinaloense de los Muertos.
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