Frank Gets Lucky

1.

Six years Sammy Price's mother handed towels at
Jimmy Ryan's hustling for tips. Then
one night she was on the bandstand
still in her work clothes suddenly
a blues singer—

Mean blues fairies stuck their forks in me
Made me moan and groan in misery—

and Frank like a circus bear
under the glaring lights—

2.

But on the trumpet,
like a night thrush: it was
a way of walking, talking.
Had it in his soul.
If Frank saw a secretary
typing fast—
that's her solo—

3.

He saw
his own life—

New York, 1939: The 3 Deuces,
The Onyx —

Or in Chinatown,
where a hardhat tried to play him
for a nickel—calling
Christmas gift
Christmas gift

He looked up as it fell—
the girders
strung with lights

Or on Swing Street,
where a guy in uniform buys him
a whiskey because
"his color doesn't matter
when he plays"—

4.

He couldn't keep quiet.
Sammy's mother under the lights,
her amazing voice
filling the house.
They dragged her out to sing but still paid her
to clean the crap house.
Said it
right on the mike—

And when he knocked out
the serviceman
Pete Brown, Maxine Sullivan,
John Kirby
all rushed down from the stage—

But I remember Frank
crying and crying
I didn't do him any good
I didn't do him any good