Contributor Series 9: If Men Had Ears
lady sings the blues
By Mark William Jackson
always the same song,
one for the lonely
the cold change
forced into the slot
pulling the record from
its sleep
the needle jabs
at the delicate vinyl trying to find a vein,
wounds howl through the crackling speakers.
the lady stands back and
lets the jukebox soothe,
and in the barroom’s plangent light
the lady sings the blues.
Mark William Jackson’s most recent poem to appear here was lights like fencers heads (September 2010).