Jalalu-Kalvert Nelson
A thoughtful few words …
August 5th, 2019
After I write these words, I will become very silent and still,
and listen to the trees falling in this great forest.
You were not just a single tree you were a great forest.
Each word was a leaf, and each book, was a tree. A forest
of memories, a forest of stories that we never knew, but
once we heard them,
they were like our skin and our heartbeats.
Your forest shaded us with your love, compassion, and truths.
And in the end,
your forest sheltered all that’s good in the world.
Your songs taught us how beautiful our own songs were.
You added grace to a world where grace is endangered.
Your forest waits for those who will once again search for
this grace, for those who come to realize that love is the
real thing. Your loving shelter will embrace them, and they
will know again what they have always known. Just this
morning, before learning of your passing, I leaned over
and looked at the books on my bed table,
among them was your last book, and I thought of you…
And like I said
at the beginning, I am gonna become quiet and still, and
listen to the trees falling in this great forest.
On the passing of the writer Toni Morrison
Born in Oklahoma City, having studied music and composition with John Eaton and Iannis Xenakis at Indiana University, Jalalu-Kalvert Nelson moved to New York in 1974 and began a life of composing and performing music and writing poems. His music took him around the world, conducting workshops, performing his music, and settling in New York and Switzerland.
His music and his poems, in different ways and with different observations, thoughts, and emotions, have led him to express the past fifty years of his life. At the same time, he has recognized that the arts and music have also and independently gone through dramatic changes. As he puts it, “My interest and hope lies in the cross-cultural currents that continue to influence music and play an important role in the expansion of its traditional definitions as well as its place in society. It seemed to me that the arts in general have a remarkable ability to bring people of diverse cultures together and to keep asking the question of what it means to be human. My life and my work as a poet and musician is in this quest. What does it mean to be human? and it is the wish of finding an understanding of what it means to be human that is the reason behind the words on these pages.”
A few short poems …
There are words like
Freedom
That sing in the hearts of the captive. And there is the name
Rosa Parks
Who sang this song So sweetly, that the Whole world
Stood up to listen.
Nothing like it
Riding on a train in late summer with the window down.
The wind blowing in my face,
as the sun descends at early evening.
Passing luscious green landscapes with mountains in the distance.
Life, the height of all senses.
End of the Line
No more spring time trips to the red earth.
These trips to visit my father are over.
No more sweet Oklahoma Aprils.
End of the line,
End of the connection.
End of the line.
Now it’s memory in the air.
St. Nicolas Avenue at 145th Street NYC
The warm October sun shining on our lives.
I stand at this corner, watching all these colors passing by,
bringing tears to my eyes,
sweet humanity.