Bobbified and Dylanized at 80

 

Yes, I hear that Dylan turned 80,

a week or so ago.

He always seemed the eternal youth.

Can 80 be the new 30,

or is it just part of the flow?

I always was suspicious

about drawing lines and such

Making judgments by ages.

But does it really matter,

all that much?

Dylan always had an interesting tie

to time and to place,

and talent and art,

among other things we rate.

He was time out of mind,

watching the river flow.

Yet timely, untimely

or sometimes ahead of time,

being present, living in the past,

pointing to the future, all at one time.

He sang about staying forever young

yet trafficked in music however old.

He never wanted to be the voice of his generation;

yet sometimes played as if he wanted

that veneration.

His name a bit poetic

stood for freedom flashing.

It had little connection,

to his real name, somewhat clashing

He was a zimmer room just the same

A Robert Allen man,

A man walled

within a name.

His songs were ever changing as he performed

or spawned them differently

each time he takes the stage

He spewed them all a little diffidently.

He says he never listens to a recorded Dylan version,

because his songs are not stopped in time or place.

Never ready for reversion.

His voice and styles are ever changing,

never quite the same.

Always rearranging

As if it were a game.

He croaked, he crooned

He moaned, he mooned.

He countrified, he gospelled.

He quick talked, he spooned.

He slurred, he annunciated,

He pronounced clearly.

He seemed mocking and joking

But sometimes sang so sincerely.

He never stayed in one place

One age, or in one time.

He radio hosted

He painted pictures to be posted,

His own master pieces.

That modestly increases.

He prized in Nobel literature

When he hardly ever proses

Yet poetically speaking he ranks.

Even in all of his poses.

He claimed heritage to Woody Guthrie,

He created, he recreated,

He posed, he supposed.

His youth was a fable;

For the times he always changed it,

it never was quite stable

When asked how many folk singers,

they were in the early 60’s.

He answered in fractions, or percentages

Or in complete fictions.

When asked what his songs were about,

Dylan often retorted:

"Some are about four minutes, some … five,

…some, believe it or not, … eleven or twelve."

Some never ending, he smiled and he snorted.

He liked to be elusive

Went from authentic to commercial

His songs sold cars, soda, ladies garments, and computers.

Always controversial.

He plugged in at Newport,

When Seeger cut his chord.

He banded with the Hawks,

Spewing walk outs and dis-chords.

His songs were wrapped in albums

They were copied and covered.

But often were bootlegged

Stolen and pirated, and always rediscovered.

He recently sold his catalogue

To a too big to fail corporation

but did he ever own it.

Is this cause for celebration

Sometimes he seems

Deserving of all the time in the world

and at others hardly a second.

The length of this musing

may be worth it or a waste.

Time is elusive

and we can’t address it in haste.

His songs get discovered

by artists many-styled

there are tapes from the basement

and songs in the aisles.

I saw him on that first trip

to the bright lights of NYCity

in a dimly side room

that was crowded and oh so gritty

It was at Gerdes Folk City,

And a hat that he passed

I put a quarter in the lining

It was good timing

His fame was cast.

I was officially a paid fan.

He played for us a little longer,

He smiled and he harmonicized

like a tambourine man, but a little stronger.

A quarter at the time seemed large to a teen

the price of a yearbook,

a ticket to the silver screen

Seems hardly worth anything now

certainly not worth a year or a book

in our cyrpto constantly changing

world of pay it was hardly worth a look.

So Dylan at 80 celebrated

In concerts and art shows.

His freedom flashing

His world aglaze

His never ending tour never slows,

And he still can amaze.

Is he worth it

to pay tribute

to an everchanging symbol

I'm not sure…

But I know this

He’s a poet and a riddle

And that's why I waited,

some days past his birthday

To ponder and critique

He surely is worth it.

Are these thoughts a worth saving

I am still not so sure.

I went to “save” and “save as”

Ultimately, I wanted them to endure.

Time magazine that chronicler of life

said that Bob Dylan

lectured for his Nobel Prize

the way he’s lived his life:

on his own terms and in his own time

free of other man’s strife.

Dylan never suffered

false fake, or clayed-footed prophets

He’s the enemy of treason

Some say he was born to rock it.

He’s the enemy of strife

He’s the enemy of leisure

He’s the enemy of the unlived

meaningless pleasure

He ain't no falsified prophet

He just knows what he knows

He’s now modeled for a Hibbing monument

Clayed from his head to his toes

He goes where only the lonely can go

At 30 or 80

His lyrics are studied in college classes

As fanciful and as weighty.

11Michael Perlin, Cindy Mullaney and 9 others

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