THE LAST NIGHTS IN CUERNAVACA

In Memoriam Ian Ernest Gilmore Green, aka Gil Evans, 1912-1988

There were things I meant to ask you
about style, about form: do the breezes that blow
warmly though the night air smell of spice? Do the trees
wave eloquently as they shhhhhhh on the hillsides? How does this compare
to the roar of the distant river carving its way through the steep valley?
So many questions. How do you stick

That note up there? What makes it stay?
Why does it make me shiver
from head to toe
when I imagine hearing it
as I heard it for the first time in my young life
before I could ever even imagine you would be opening up
a whole, new world for me
even while you
were spending your last nights on earth
in the unorchestrated breezes
of Cuernavaca

James MacFarlane Williams

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