THE LITTLE RICHARD STORY
The god of Abraham is a true God. Now
we gonna do “Rip It Up.”
—Reverend Richard Penniman
Nothing is talking to you
in the numbers, in the leaves.
No mambo mambo on the wind.
No colored streamers in the skies.
No one has pasted little notes
to you, like kisses.
No Fred, no Ginger,
no sudden bursting
into Stone Age languages.
No angels clustered in the rafters.
No giants sacked out on the stove.
On a day like this,
without the music
of appearances, creatures
could land and you
would not be able to explain
anything to them, not
the fearless industry
of beavers, or why dust bunnies
prefer the dark, not even
how Little Richard
himself came into being.
—Rachel Loden
____
from her book, Hotel Imperium (Georgia)