I never was
the cool or chic
I was not le freak,
not wild – I merely
mixed my tapes
prepared to bloom when cool
meant math
or having read Camus,
but still I knew the moves
and danced along alone
until one night
game—set–match.
Today Lilian is hosting at dVerse, trying to find some songtitles from the ones that were number on from the billboard list at https://mybirthdayhits.com/# … unfortunately it didn’t work for me so I went to Wikipedia instead and browsed through the years until I found something I recognized. The photo of me is a few years before Le Freak made the billboards, but it was the only song I listened to at the time from this list. I might actually have danced to it as well as it was the same year as I finished highschool.
1961 Will You Love Me Tomorrow?
1962 Peppermint twist
1963 Walk right in
1964 There! I’ve Said It Again
1965 Downtown
1966 We Can Work It Out
1967 I’m a believer
1968 Judy in Disguise (With Glasses)
1969 I Heard It Through the Grapevine
1970 I Want You Back
1971 Knock Three Times
1972 American Pie
1973 Superstition
1974 You’re Sixteen
1975 Please Mr. Postman
1976 Love Rollercoaster
1977 Car Wash
1978 Baby Come Back
1979 Le Freak
Beautiful, dear 💕
Love what you did with the song title here…..good ending too. But mostly, I love the photograph of you! Do you remember….did you pick out the orange hat and orange boots to match? Dapper, even as a young boy 🙂
My mother dressed me I think…
Oh, what a great song! I can picture you, a little shy, a little uncertain, but giving it heaps when you felt free to do so! Lovely, open write.
This is such a gorgeous, gorgeous write, Bjorn! 💝💝 The title blends in perfectly and I agree, “cool meant math or having read Camus.” Sigh .. maths and I never got along haha 😀
Bjorn, such a nice picture of you when you were a kid. I really love this part:
“but still I knew the moves
and danced along alone”
You reminded me of the scene in “Napolean Dynomite” that I love love love so much:
I say fly your freak flag with pride.
Bjorn,
Couldn’t help but smile at the picture, and the fact that shyness be damned, you rose to the occasion as demanded.
pax,
dora
As a poet, your former shyness has evaporated, and your creative energy holds together this rag-tag group of international poetic scribblers. I love the hit list you included; mine became the foundation for my whole poem.
Camus has always been cool in my book! Enjoyed this peek into your childhood!
Great poem, Bjorn, and I loved every single song on your list. I had no luck with Lillian’s URL either — it only went back to 1940, which wasn’t far enough for me!!
Inspired, my friend! Loved the imagery!
You were the coolest (math and Camus? Wow! Cool!!) and the others just didn’t know your kind of cool. Oh my. Soooooo cool.
Song list too! 👏
You were the offset, on the other side of the world, to my insanity — so thank you for keeping balance to the world Bjorn… 🙂👍🏼
This isn’t the first photo from your childhood that I’ve seen… and now it’s official – you were cute! 😀
❤
David
So, it did happen one night….
I enjoyed this. Your photo is wonderful and your triumph is what we all want for ourselves. In finding our path and purpose, we win!
It is great that it “happened one night”.
You had me at Camus, but also that you were prepared to learn the moves, I did too. I loved Camus more than my moves 🙂