Villanelle of Billie Holiday

Lady Day sang with nightingale power.
Like her namesake, she picked a pocket or two,
But that strange fruit would soon turn sour.

She had the jazz and a voice that could tower,
As she lit up the room with the songs that she knew
Lady Day sang with nightingale power.

She saw the dark side as she started to flower
She took to her wings and that nightingale flew,
But that strange fruit would soon turn sour.

Into the dance halls singing all hours,
Her style and her awesome confidence grew,
Lady Day sang with nightingale power.

And she became famous, on her gifts they would shower
And with it the drugs and the alcohol too,
And that strange fruit would soon be sour.

And in her last days in pain she would cower
But she smiled at the memories of singing the blues:
Lady Day sang with nightingale power
But that strange fruit would soon turn sour.

Billie Holiday, American Jazz singer, died today in 1959.