Whatever you like
Is it Gospel? Soul?
Is it Country & Western?
Rock ‘n Roll?
Maybe it’s jazz
In a smoky bar
Maybe the beat
Of the bass guitar
But it don’t matter, baby
What you choose
‘Cause sitting here, sweetheart
I’ve just got the blues
There’d be only one tune
If I had the choice
The beautiful music
The sound of your voice.
Look at you there
Blow-dried hair
You stop to pull your stockings up
The boys all stop and stare
Some they just want mothering
Or to see the bits you’re covering
Others maybe wondering
If they can make you care.
***
Me? I’m old and wiser
Emotionally a miser
I’ve seen what you are selling
And I know it isn’t real
But you are so very glamorous
And I so very amorous
Can we overlook reality?
Can we cut a deal?
I owe most of these words to a friend of mine who wrote them 40 odd years ago and has probably forgotten about them. I am not sure how well I remember them either.
I’m a bopper of a copper
And I really dig the rhythm and blues
With my bright red socks
And my regulation blue suede shoes
My name is Jo-Jo Friday
And I’m always looking round for clues
You can see me chewing gum in the interview
After the news
I’m a cracker, not a hacker
A position I refuse to abuse.
I owe thanks to my sensitive friend Stoner who gave birth to the idea of a message in the sand for me. I doubt that I do the idea justice.
I wrote a message for you in the sand when the tide was low.
Knowing that it would be erased, like memory, with the passage of time.
Speaking to you of things that could not be spoken
and yet I wondered if you might somehow hear it carried by the sea breeze that passed overhead on the endless journey towards the centre of everything.
Whispering.
I watched as the waves completed the relentless voyage across the oceans. Each with a message of its own.
Forever. Forever. Forever.
Every advance still closer before retreating, exhausted, back into the void.
The gentle invasion eventually eroding my carefully chosen words.
Letter by letter.
Until all was as it had been.
The grains carefully rearranged to conceal their secret.
Richmond Road 