... The form of the poem mimics the liberty that music, and jazz in particular, provides the artist. The very nature of music is that it demands a certain level of experimentation and creativity. Jazz is a type of music where the underlying foundation is one of explicit experimentation through improvisation; there are no rigid guidelines. Similarly, "Poem for Don Cherry" has no formal or traditional boundaries; it is an unrestrained depiction of images and ideas. The poem reads, "The mouth she wore/who although she wore jeans I/could see she grew hair/on her legs, /her bald feet." This passage is not framed in any traditional sense because the words seem to crawl over the page. This can be seen as a comment on the experimentation that is an integral part of jazz composition. The actual words are hard to put together but they seem to convey a sense of admiration. He ...

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