The Last Time I Danced
Grocery store run
Jeans with a big raggy hole
where my knee protrudes
Tan sneaks with pink shoelaces
(no big panama with a purple hat band…
but then, that’s a long time ago)
Chugging along with a cart full of
healthy foods for our responsible diet
and in consideration that we are both
in our 50s now and then
over the intercom
“Dancin’ in the Street”
Martha and the Vandellas,
none of that Mick and whosis crap
Another woman looks at me from
the cereal section and then we both
lay excited eyes on a dude in
Harley jacket and old boots
trolling the Gatorade
Who’s on first?
As if you have to ask
I take the lead line, inciting the riot
The three of us break into song
and dance like the freaks we were
like the freaks we still are
with every ounce of hippie left in us
She’s showin her tat of Marley on her
left arm, he’s swappin a picture of Jesus
on the back of his neck and me, I got no marks
but smile lines chiseled on my cheeks
We’re reeling in total abandon and
oblivious to the folks at either end of the aisle
Even the vegetable guy left his post
And at the fadeout, we’re fading out too
back to our carts as though nothing happened
The other shoppers burst into applause
and we all run back together in the
middle of the aisle to take a bow and
hug each other like there’s no tomorrow
Haven’t seen them again
Perhaps we were all each other’s angels
if only for that moment
Reminders that you can always let that
freak flag fly high enough to glide
as long as you keep enough freak inside
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For dverse, who called for Carefree Hours, or the last time you did something out of pure delight. This is delight, rebellion, and a three-person unplanned flash mob all in one package! Also for “Strange Bedfellows” at Sunday Scribblings and “Walk of Life” at Poetic Bloomings. I don’t walk; I dance, and as for strange bedfellows, I thought it would be nice to have them be total strangers with something in common but NO business dancing in the middle of the grocery store!! Peace, Amy
Never before have I witness such an outpouring of love as for Marques Bovre, a local Madison musician who has played every venue from coffeehouses to large clubs to churches. He is the Artist-in-Residence at our church, Lake Edge UCC here in Madison. Marques has been battling an illness and the event tonight, chock-full of bands, was a fundraiser to cover his medical bills. (Universal health care, anyone?) Marques himself garnered strength to play with his two previous bands, So Dang Yang and Marques and the Evil Twins (yeah, there are four folks in that one!). We’re praying for his recovery, and man, he really BRANG it tonight, if you can dig that!
Impromptu (for Marques)
Tribute to a great and good Madison musician;
a rare, beautiful brother, fighting a rare, ugly disease.
Songwriter of extraordinary range and style,
Marques can bring the Holy Spirit into a rock club.
This night, it’s all his songs played by many bands.
The stage is spacious and filled with love –
rowdy crowd vibes spill up over the edge, flooding the stage.
Band throbbing, pulsations vibrating in our collective gut.
My glass of local brew is refilled by Craig
and I know the time is coming when the lure of
raw elements grip me and I will ascend the steps.
Musicians are an enigma: We have to do it.
The final tune is a jam; the beat renders me weightless,
abandon rapidly released. Spasms of hesitancy are overcome
and come tumbling out as overwhelming enthusiasm
for the task at hand… it’s about affirming Marques.
We are all vessels, vital elements of the shout-out.
the crowd pleaser, the old classic everyone knows,
and we release full-tilt at the top of our lungs:
“You ain’t seen nothin’ like the Mighty Quinn.”
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For the Sunday Whirl: Elements, tumbling, spasm, released, weightless, enigmas, grip, rapid, glass, pulsations, rare, spacious. Thanks, Brenda, for mining the work of Billy Collins to give us this Wordle! The words literally called out to me and I wrote this shortly after arriving home from Marques’ gig. Peace, and please add Marques and this family to your prayers. Peace in the key of D, Amy
Sharp Little Pencil 