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Unread 05-12-2022, 10:08 PM
John Isbell John Isbell is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2017
Location: TX
Posts: 6,630
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I hope you feel better soon, Fliss. Here's hoping you get a good night's rest.

Here now are the Reverend Julius Cheeks and The Sensational Nightingales singing "Burying Ground." The reverend was a big influence on the young Wilson Pickett: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkxO9gBsp1E

And here's a little poem about it:


Burying Ground


I wonder can you hear – the Reverend
cries out – the church bells tolling? At his lead,
the Nightingales call. What has caught this man
like some bird in its toils? The song unspools
its slow freight of mortality, as up
above the grave – above the gospel chorus –
he soars in hope and grief. We listeners,
what do we hear? Can this man’s beating heart
beat in our breast? Can truth descend in fire
to wake our soul from slumber in the end?

A wet day. And they’re putting out the lawn
across the way, in green squares. They have turf
they’re laying down like carpet. From above,
no drop of rain is falling, but all night
it must have rained, since every leaf is wet
among our zinnias. And still the turf
drops onto the bare soil. On my drive home,
I listened to the Reverend Julius Cheeks
take the lead vocal as his gospel chorus
exploded into harmony. They filled
my ear with pattern and intent; there was
such meaning, meaning almost vanished, as
they told their tale of the new burying ground.



Last edited by John Isbell; 05-12-2022 at 10:09 PM. Reason: rest