Ode to Nina Simone

Transforming us with blues, boogie-woogie.
using her classical training to quash rage,
she dug into our souls, tore open hearts, exposed our pysche.
Before King's dream, she mounted battles onstage
from Carnegie to Harlem, leaving beloved Bach behind,
she battered walls of injustice, rattled abusers' cages, yet
allowed herself to be battered, her sanity strewn.
Nina, a Harlem Renaissance soul out of time,
whose good intentions drowned in madness and regret,
infused righteous power into every tune.