Take me with you, Godfather
1965
barely
alive
see the T.A.M.I.
Show
at the El Monte Drive-In
Marvin, Smokey, Jan &
Dean,
Chuck Berry, Beach Boys, Billy J, the
Supremes,
all great and all brushed
aside
by James Brown’s one legged power
glide
across the stage into “Out of
Sight”
pegged pantsed
panic
Famous Flames flare
furiously
10,000 megawatt grin
blazing ancestral light
primal plasticene
pompadour
joltin jellied ankle
dance
checked sport coat and double breasted
vest
solid colored
pants
Prisoner of Love/Please Please
Please
Danny Ray with the
cape
James repeatedly falling hard on his
knees
begging his
love
his face broken by
misery
a man driven insane by
pain
then it’s time to get
aboard
the Night
Train
people around me
shriek/whistle
and cheer in their
cars
electricity sparks off
James
like the night sky’s
stars
hyper-kinetic dance machine
moves
the band roars out light speed
grooves
then
stops
NIGHT! NIGHT! NIGHT!
NIGHT!
he
screams
band slams back into ecstatic turbo
gear
as the Jerk/Boogaloo/Mashed
Potatoes/Skate
Camel Walk,
too
possess the Babaloawo along with Shango
and Oshun
James slides us up the Nile to the
Moon
our shared origins binding our
future
as people spill out their
vehicles
beating their hoods and
roofs
howling/honking/flashing car
lights
a riot
response
on rolling asphalt between orderly
speaker poles
James
Brown
drop down
quick
splits
up laughs
bows
and he’s
gone
–Rex Butters
Posted: Mon - January 1, 2007 at 07:06 PM