For a time the Pong Unit (a jazz-rock-funk-blues band
I've been working with since 1988) was rehearsing and creating
new tunes at Joe Hasiewicz's Quiet Earth Studio in Villa
Park, Illinois. We called these creations "pongs"
... not songs ... not poetry ... not words over music or
music over words ... "pongs". And I wanted
to create one that would express the "upward looking
and the light" with as much power and drive as the
chaotic side of current society seemed able to put forth
nihilism as a answer to the big question "Why?"
I don't know if it was on our first go ... or the second
... or the fifteenth, but very soon into the creation of
"Small Boy" we hit a groove that was haunting,
and locked onto it.
The seeds for "Small Boy" came from memories
of preschool days playing on the summer lawn with my first
friend Donald; and from a recollection of my father snapping
a photo of me at age two running through my grandmother's
gangway into the bright sunlight.
Each time I perform it I try to return to that moment
in the Quiet Earth Studio when Heath the drummer fixed his
eyes on me ... and I, mine on his ... and we knew that we
had found something strong and full of light, wind, and
leaves ... something that transported me back to my old
neighborhood ... and there I am
banging on my mother's spinet piano; once again a ....
This was the rain ... (he tinkles some keys)
... this was the thunder ... (Bang!)
And this the electro-static stitches
Knit now and again
In the gray growing darkness
Gripping the sky.
This was the bright blue ...
... the sun.
Steps of a spider.
Light on a downspout.
Beads on the paint flakes
Peeling off tin.
This was the moon
Dissolving in the window.
Wrapping a shade,
The passage of air.
It moved the curtains,
Sheer white from the wood sill
Wet to the alley
Caught in a spin.
This was the cry
Calling at midnight.
Voiceless a cry
Calling within.
These were the footsteps.
Someone was coming.
No one to listen.
No one to care.
He was a small boy
Running from father.
He was a father
Running to son.
They were a moment
Caught in a photo.
Caught in the sunlight.
Caught in a spin.
Here is the green lawn
Under the sunlight.
Green is the empire
Bounded by walks.
Here he is running
Fast through the red leaves
Falling in autumn
Into a pile.
Face of all sunlight
Passage through gangways
Taken at emergence,
Emergence to light.
This is the bright face,
Face of October,
Racing the summer
Indian ghosts.
Here are the brushed leaves
Frosted at morning.
Curling at sunset.
Curling in smoke.
This is the laced gown
Garment of snowfall
Flaking upon him
Falling within.
He was a small boy
Running from father.
He was a father
Running to son.
They were a moment
Caught in a photo.
Caught in the sunlight.
Caught in a spin.
This was the rain.
This was the thunder.
This was the lightning
Stitching the sky.
This was the bright blue.
This was the sunlight.
These are the stars
Spinning on high.
