American of the Century (for Bobcats everywhere...)
A jackdaw wisdom, tight-lined mouth and hands
Fashioned a diamond gift for the burgeoning culture
Like an alchemist drawing elements from the soil, but not so base.
Borrowing himself from bluesmen, small-town owners of the road,
From Rambling Jack, from Whitman, Guthrie,
Thomas and Rimbaud. And Macon’s finest too. Out of
Deepest Minnesota what would he choose himself to be?
The joker of the pack, claiming his slice of pie,
Convert-rabbi, neo-prophet, passing evangelist,
Unsentimental, unforeseen, unloved romanticist.
Wallflower gazer, laser, thrower of small verse grenades,
Painting threats of judgement in the mirrors
Of the mighty on the stolen hills.
A man too easy to dismiss, if not quite finally –
A contradicted, flawed, sometime-misogynist,
Ingenue, leaping the book from faith to faith.
However, when the time runs down
Those around may still recall all faith is one, a range
Of many a ledge and foothold. For those who have to climb.
Hibbing was once a mining town. Must have had fragments of sharp refrain
Floating in the post-war air, around the ears of teens and babes: Ma Rainey, Mahalia,
Dock Boggs and Robert Johnson, all of the splendid choir. As the ore ran thin
A voice emerged that “could not sing”, against a pounded piano, harp and buzzed guitar.
And hit a chord of confluence that five decades would ring. Would seize
Its moment in the light of centre stage before an avalanche of dross
Would cover it again, but even then, left trace for anyone who cared.
Minstrel tunes, quick river songs. Railroad, fly tree, putdown songs,
Songs of desire, so numerous and singular that none in that haze century
Could interpret their plurality. You didn’t dance
And if you had to learn the words, he offered you good luck.
No marketplace, no double-track, rolling his stone down a single rail.
The first rap: homesick blues. And songs to power brokers
From the highways, blacks and jews.
He fanned the flames of heroes, names among the brave:
Medger Evers, Emmett Till, Rubin Carter, Davey Moore,
George Jackson, Hattie Carroll, Lenny Bruce and Catfish.
He unlocked and protested love, that broken-glass illusion of what little
Might be saved. The light went down, cold beauty fell away, sensibility
Waned. But again it grew with age, thus he
Survives today, not castaway, his vinyl digitized.
You can check the bins and racks:
Data units in the aisles, blood spilt on the tracks.
For you who hire to dull the danger’s edge
And promote disgrace of person for commercial gain
[...] Read more
poem by Frank Bana
Added by Poetry Lover
Comment! | Vote! | Copy!
