The ambitious six-part narrative “Juke” is a poetic take on the legendary folk tales of the Mississippi Delta Bluesmen. Here, the universal tale of a meeting with the Devil at the crossroads is bungled ironically enough by the sin and vice of an aspiring musician.
“JUKE”
i.
i left the delta on a train
for chicago in the pouring rain
but the central line, it runs two ways
and will return again someday
mississippi chicago
the more you look the more you know
it makes no difference, you see
pullin’ cotton , packin’ meat
a stella flat-top made of birch
stolen from a bronzeville church
i can’t sing or play a note
yet fortune waits for me i’m told
there is a man
they say there’s some man
ii.
down the river-levee road
worn and weathered two-tone brogue
i heard them singing at st paul’s
out for miles through the walls
i sat outside the church house door
friday worst and cursed and poor
i drew ol’ stella from her sack
but she refused to answer back
sat alone there for a while
a church girl found me there and smiled
if you can really play that thing
then you will strum and i will sing
there is a man
they say there’s some man
iii.
and over off beyond the graves
an old cottonwood for shade
but when i tried to play my part
she put her hand upon my heart
a booming voice of righteous rage
twice my size and twice my age
her daddy standing in the sun
with a hardware store shotgun
jack-rabbit, fast as i could
no time for goodbye for good
don’t look back, don’t leave no tracks
lay low until the sky goes black
there is a man
they say there’s some man
iv.
they say some man, don’t give no name
but he offers fortune, offers fame
and i can have all of these things
if i let him tune my flat-top strings
there is a man, comes at midnight
but only when the moon is right
south of rosedale black as coal
sign away in blood, your soul
i look into the starry sky
waiting as some clouds pass by
the harvest moon looms large and low
a few more hours left to go
there is a man
they say there’s some man
v.
i crawl out of a ditch near town
and put an ear down to the ground
they say they really lettin’ loose
some dirt floor shack down main and bruce
an old tin roof and old plank walls
i took the stage corn liquor balls
they cry a tear with bertha lee
but they could only laugh at me
i set out drunk alone ashamed
just hoping they forget my name
just me and stella my guitar
and lightnin’ in an old fruit jar
there is a man
they say there’s some man
vi.
mumblin’ stumblin’ south on main
i fell face first into the drain
but all will change when midnight comes
but it was already a half past one
was it just my luck was it just my fate
to be forever drunk and late
the shadow man would just not wait
mississippi one and eight
so i smashed that old guitar to bits
ain’t getting anywhere with it
but still the taste is in my mouth
hang down my head, keep heading south
there is a man
they say there’s some man
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