Flipside

31/08/2020 –  Poem a Day Compilation



When I was young

I’d sit by my grandfather’s feet

Listening to records

Playing on the turntable.



He had a really old one,

You had to flip the record yourself

And place the needle carefully

So it wouldn’t scratch.



We’d listen to the classics

Music he’d grown up loving

And I knew all the words

Even though they were well before my time.



He’d say, “Flip it over, kid”

And I’d jump up from the floor.

Then, he’d smile.

He didn’t do that often.



I’d take the needle off

And carefully lift the record

Turning it on one motion

In the blink of an eye.



After I’d set the B side playing

He’d watch me dance to the old songs

Reminiscing about his dance hall days

But I couldn’t imagine him dancing, then.



I still listen to music every day

But it’s not the same unless it’s on vinyl.

To hear the crackle and the noise,

That’s what my heart remembers.



“Music isn’t meant to be perfect,”

My grandfather told me one day,

“It’s meant to sound lived in,

Just like hearing it in the flesh.”



I didn’t know what he meant that day,

And I wouldn’t for a very long time.

He saw me grow and find my own music

And we shared it on that old turntable.



Every year, under the Christmas tree,

A flat, square present waited to be unwrapped

By a child, a teenager, a young woman

And, finally, a mother of rambunctious boys.



But as I sat at his funeral all those years later

Hearing the music they’d chosen for him

It finally made all the sense in the world to me.

It was all too perfect.



Ave Maria carried effortlessly

Across the room as if sung by angels,

And tears rolled down the cheeks

Of relatives and family friends.



But it wasn’t until I heard the hum

Of that old record player

And Vera Lynn’s voice rang out

As if standing before us all.



    “We’ll meet again,

    Don’t know where, don’t know when,

    But I’m sure we’ll meet again

    Some sunny day.”



My chin trembled,

My eyes welled up,

I caught my breath

And felt him there.



That lived in sound filled my ears,

And swept over my heart

And his last words came back to me,

“See you on the flipside, kid.”