Who doesn’t love a good Mick Jagger poem? Who doesn’t love a good poem? Come on now: the details and last line should be enough to make you self-described non-poets take notice of the piece. Me? I’m swooning about the form and the lines and that last line.
Mick Jagger (World Tour, 2008)
He stands on stage
after spot-lit stage, yowling
with his rubber mouth. If you
turn off the sound he’s
a ruminating bovine,
a baby’s face tasting his first
sour orange or spitting
spooned oatmeal out.
Rugose cheeks and beef
jerky jowls, shrubby hair
waxed, roughed up, arms
slung dome-ward, twisted
branches of a tough tree, knees
stomped high as his sunken chest.
Oddities aside, he’s a hybrid
of stamina and slouch,
tummy pooch, pouches under
his famous invasive rolling eyes.
He flutters like the pages
of a dirty book, doing
the sombrero dance, rocking
around the microphone’s
round black foot , one hand
gripping the skinny metal rod,
the other pumping its victory fist
like he’s flushing a chain toilet.
Old as the moon and sleek
as a puma circling the herd,
a slim redwood on one shaggy leg,
head in the clouds, arms full
of skinks, tree rats, black-capped
birds. The vein on his forehead
pops. His hands drop into fists.
He bows like a beggar then rises
like a monarch. Sir Mick,
our bony ruler. Jagger, slumping
off stage shining with sweat.
Oh please don’t die, not now,
not ever, not yet.
Poem from here
As seen here
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