Alan (Chong) Lau
  
  
Poem Off The Album Cover for “Bill Evans Trio Sunday at the Village Vanguard 
                                                            featuring Scott La Faro”

i see this bookish guy
with an accountant’s glasses
in a white shirt
the sleeves rolled half-way up
and hands laid out naked
on a bare wood table
a half-smoked cigarette
held snug
between the second & third finger
of his left hand
the one
with a watch
circling his wrist

one expects numbers or statistics
pulled from a battered briefcase
the snap of a slide rule
the click of a calculator
the dialogue of economics
but one hears
instead the soft
tinkle of notes
caressed out of a piano
that float off to the ceiling

behind the click
of wine glasses
smeared with lipstick traces
sweaty finger prints
the laughter
of casual conversation
and the haze
of smoke
one imagines 
the lazy drift
of blue snowflakes
filling the crisp air
that we breathe
into a limitless sky
with delicate pleas

p l e a s
for mercy, pleas
for understanding, pleas
and for peace, please
p e a c e 
p e a c e  p e a c e
p  e  a  c  e    p  e  a  c  e    p  e  a  c  e

ballad for monk

thelonious sphere monk
is not an acquired taste
but he is a record played
at a slower speed
than the ordinary ear
can imagine

his notes
deliberately plucked out
by thick fingers
move 
with a quiet strength

the intense squiggle/wiggle
of an earth worm
the slow undulation
of a slug
the silver slither
of a snail
glistening in the sun

the bob and quiver
of the bluest jello
sliding out of its mold

the crisp trinkle tinkle
of ice cubes
hissing bubbles
in a shot glass of scotch

or the collapsing
shimmer/jiggle
of a new slinky
pulled our of a box
ambling down
a white picket fence

maybe what he
wants to say
is just this

that beauty doesn’t always
come at the speed
of a bullet
or wear fashionable gowns
but comes in
as a rusty razor blade
tearing open a love letter
or the stumbling waltz
of a bird
alone on a pole
who stretches
each note out
for introspection
before turning it
into a bruised song
for a cloudy sky

ASK ME NOW   THINK OF ONE   BA-LUE BOLIVAR BA-LUES-ARE   EPISTROPHY   
COMING ON THE HUDSON   GREEN CHIMNEYS  IN WALKED BUD   LET’S COOL ONE   
RUBY MY DEAR   STRAIGHT, NO CHASER   I MEAN YOU   HACKENSACK   FOUR IN ONE
BLUE MONK   EVIDENCE   TRINKLE, TINKLE   LITTLE ROOTIE TOOTIE   MONK’S DREAM   
PANNONICA   MISTERIOSO   BOO BOO’S BIRTHDAY   NUTTY   RHYTHM-A-NING   
52ND STREET THEME   BRIGHT MISSISSIPPI   ROUND MIDNIGHT  BEMSHA SWING   
WELL, YOU NEEDN’T

thelonious sphere monk
is not an acquired taste
but he is
a record played 
at a slower speed
than the ordinary ear
can imagine  



Alan (Chong) Lau is a poet/artist living in Seattle, Washington.

The art works above, and many others, are available from ARTXCHANGE Gallery.
 
 

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