The Toothless Soothsayer
I must have been four, or maybe five
When grandfather said, with a snicker,
“Where a man wouldn’t go with a Colt .45
That boy will follow his pecker.”
Half a century now mocks:
I’d surely be elated
If Papa’s eye had turned to stocks
Or land speculated.
I’ve frequently suspected my granddad was speaking from his own experience.
One of the rewards the Universe gave me for getting to be this old was the raging hormones fading into oblivion. There’s still plenty of passion in my life, but it’s of a different nature, and it listens to the voice of reason.
I’d never have believed back when passion was a misery to be endured that the Universe had other passions in mind if a person could just make room for them between the preoccupations.
And yet, today I listen to any one of the songs below and it brings back vivid, pleasant memories of [usually] one woman. The shadow of the past agonies is still there if I choose to examine it, but if I don’t the songs and the passage of time allows it all to be a bit nostalgic. And the songs don’t last long enough to insist on thorough remembering.
Old Jules
(Arirang) Korean Folk Song [She never had an orchestra background that I recall]
Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris, We’ll Sweep Out the Ashes said things too well. It was one of several I put as a single song on a 90 minute tape and wore out. Live version, no embed: http://youtu.be/GQJAsEZ-S3I
Hank Snow
90 Miles an Hours Down a Deadend Street was another ‘said things too well’.
Terry Stafford – “Suspicion” (1964)
Leroy Van Dyke Just Walk on By
DALE & GRACE – I’M LEAVING IT UP TO YOU.wmv
Johnny Duncan and Janie Fricke Thinking of a Rendezvous
Eartha Kitt – C’est Si Bon (Live Kaskad 1962)
Leonard Cohen – Take This Waltz
Merrilee Rush & the Turnabouts – Angel of the Morning
We’ll Sing In The Sunshine– Gale Garnett- 1964
Third Rate Romance Low Rent Renzezvous – Amazing Rhythm Aces
Leonard Cohen – Closing Time
So Far From Heaven 