The Tookany Review Vol.
III Spring/Summer 2007
In this issue
Edited by Deborah Fries
For
more information about
writing workshops offered by
the Cheltenham Township Adult School, contact:
Cheltenham Township Adult
School
1414 Panther Road
Wyncote, PA 19095
Phone: 215-887-1720
Nehru Nelson
three poems
Bent Morning Blues
"To sing da blues, you got to
live da blues, and to live da blues,
you got to pay dem dues."
---Word on the Street---
Talk about paying some dues
Today, I got out of bed with the
bent morning blues
Head hanging on my shoulder like I
was slapped by a bear
And only one eye open as I slump in
my chair
Got those bent morning blues and I
can't go nowhere
Woke up with the bent morning blues
They usually get you on a Monday
But I've had 'em on Tuesday too
And Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday
If you must know the truth
I even had 'em on Sunday morning way
back in my youth
It's the bent morning blues that
wake you up with bad hair
And it's those bent morning blues
that say, "chile, you ain't goin’ nowhere"
But I never had the bent morning
blues on Friday, no siree!
'cause when the Eagle flies on
Friday, those blues just let me be
inside the skinny
if you move inside the skinny,
you'll know what i know
if i lay the skinny on you, you'll have a
better point of view
if i bend your ear with the skinny, you'll
feel better about it all
but only for a while
because tales told from one to another have
a way of expanding
short explodes to tall
the file becomes fat with briefs
to the point at which the original meaning
is lost
what was then is only an argument
about what someone thought it was
so, i think i'll keep the skinny all to
myself
that's right, all alone here
just me and the skinny of it all
Nehru Rodriquez Nelson is a lawyer, poet, lyricist, songwriter, jazz enthusiast, and amateur jazz piano player and composer. He was born and raised in Philadelphia, PA and currently resides in Cheltenham. He has been reading, writing, and performing poetry for over thirty years and he has been an active participant in many local writing workshops over the past five years including the CTAS Poetry Workshop. Nehru has recently assembled a limited collection of broadsides of his poetry that he intends to distribute soon via the World Wide Web. He is also currently working on a collection of his poetry for publication called The Street is My Father.