The Touch

       The Touch

I’m in the general store’s lot when the D.J. proclaims 
	“There was only the one 
Jimmy,” and so as I hear the too-blue sounds 
	of “When I Grow 
Too Old to Dream,” I know what’s up and turn 
	blue too and moan.

Late-winter slush. The world for this spell is hopeless. 
	But at last I go in
and at the counter is Maggie. She’s my friend, 
	and is always cheerful 
and that, I guess, revives me a little. Tonight,
	 I notice her hands, 

how lovely they look as she takes my simple dollar 
	and taps the register   
and I take her store’s good coffee, hands on my mind. 
	As I leave, I remember
an earlier show today that featured a woman 
	whose company offers 

robotic vacuum cleaners, and she has bigger 
	plans: dishwashers, 
mowers, cars... and of course the military
	has been in touch. 
As a little child she saw R2D2 
	and “just went bonkers” 

for that bleeping machine in the first of the Star Wars movies 
	to put me asleep.
Robots will search through houses, defuse bombs, 
	and la di da 
go kill The Enemy. And so, said she 
	-–no irony–

“they’ll keep countless people alive.” Then another guest 
	came on to discuss
how Internet banking is now “the hottest Web 
	activity," 
apart, that is, from downloading porn.  I think, 
	No muss, no fuss,  

and I shiver. Make a babe or bomb and get 
	quick bang for your buck.
And nowhere any hand to stop you. My own 
	small buck for coffee  
came of scribbling a check, which I handed to Paula 
	the teller. We spoke 


as always of weather's growing nasty, 
	how fast our kids seem to grow, 
but they’re doing okay, how another farm is set 
	to go down in flames 
and she wishes she owned the bank and could cover the farmer’s 
	debt. Me too. 

Back on the road with my cup, I can’t help recalling
	from a lifetime ago,  
the Blue Note albums with Turrentine on sax, 
	Burrell on guitar, 
and that Hammond B3 at The Showboat in Philadelphia, 
	where I sat watching 

as much as hearing –what I’d do to sit 
	by that bandstand right now
as the elegant fingers punch out their riffs and fills, 
	the bebop lines 
crossing and mixing and fighting with the soul-blues stuff, 
	because Oh Lord, 

there is such life in those hands! And though I was only 
	a phony white brat 
in my stupid funky shades and was furthermore 
	under-age for that club 
and that best of organ-side tables and the whiskey sours
	I kept knocking back, 

I’d still declare that a touchable blue rose into 
	that room. For which reason,
though I was alone, I wasn’t lonely. Short 
	on courage, I didn’t
shake his hand, but even if this Vermont 
	is half a thousand

miles from that palpable night, and almost as far 
	from that corner club, 
I’ve kept this notion of Jimmy Smith as my friend. 
	And somehow he is,
if only because he touched me once and it’s with me
	still, the touch.