Aretha Franklin | Becoming is Superior to Being

Lordi-ArethaFeelgood Photo by David Redfern/Getty

Here’s a link to The New Yorker Culture Desk posted this morning by Emily Lordi.
Here a Youtube video of Aretha singing “Dr. Feelgood” at the Fillmore West in The New Yorker. Click here.

Traveling Companions At Our Driftwood Seventieth Wind-Turned Age 3 comments

Bob Dylan — Image by kenne

I am a child of the forties,
a rebel of the fifties,
becoming a native of the sixties.
Each decade saw the influence of art;
not as the creator, but in me,
the person is listening and seeing
what the creator sent along.

Together we have traveled as companions,
moving along and being moved.
Now, in my driftwood seventh wind-turned age,*
“I am of the old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise.”**
An age whose troubadour companions have included:
Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Paul Simon, George Clinton, Paul McCartney,
Aretha Franklin, Carole King, Brian Wilson, Lou Reed, Jimi Hendrix, and Jerry Garcia.

Whether a mere coincidence with others, I am ever grateful —
each having moved me to thought in the course of my daily life.
Often alone with my thoughts, each shaped by others in a sea of music,
I picture an image, one I might take with my camera.
Knowing the words and images don’t come out of nowhere,
but are the result of shared paths for my feet to use,
I always keep an eye on my traveling companions,
and people down the road who might bring a fresh breath of air,
making me younger than I am now – he said, pausing with reflection.