on magic Blue Velvet carpet
the Moonglows, came in from Philly,
flew through my radio on Jocko air
…..ee diddly ah po!
…. this Jock on the scene
…. with my record machine
… Sayin oo papa doo
… and how do ya do!—
smooth-as-blue-velvet vocals,
cloud-high falsetto, music blue,
black, mind-blowing, new
now distant as first lust—
Secret Love in three-chord riffs
and four-part tight fits, harmonies
snug as hand-in-glove, ooo-whas
fluid, silken, over spoken lines
in bass tones, lush, as if
celestial spheres in night skies
were crooning young love:
…. I Knew From The Start:
which of course I never did
…. The Ten Commandments of Love:
as hard to keep as the originals
…. their name itself:
moonglow, which, being brilliant, full,
I almost understood
…. and my insistent imagination:
which has been both boon & curse,
bad & good
and
of course,
…. Sincerely:
spun from the naivete of
the possessed
—but now, in a room
closer-to-nearly-departed
listening as if ears were given gifts
of bygone stars from utter space,
the Moonglows come in new waves
lofted by an Amazon, Alexa,
who rides them through clouds of algorithms
to a stark black cylinder on a table,
suave as they were then,
but without Jocko’s
loose, hot, cool
Jim Culleny
11/21/17
.
Blink 