‘Dance in the Light’
THE SPIRIT OF RESISTANCE, CAPTURED IN POETRY
This is a difficult time for Smokey Robinson. And yet that did not stop an English crowd from applauding vigorously and approvingly last Sunday after seeing and hearing him recite his provocative poem, “A Black American,” on video during a literature festival.
Robinson originally voiced the work some 20 years ago on Russell Simmons’ Def Poetry TV series, which was broadcast by HBO. More recently, the Motown maestro offered an expanded version of his powerful poem, as captured here.
The positive reaction of a roomful of Britons occurred on June 8 during the Clevedon Literature Festival in the West of England, where (ahem) yours truly gave a talk about “Motown: The Poetry of Young America.” This followed the announcement of the winner of “motorcitysixty,” a competition for – yes – poems about Motown, which was organised under the auspices of the Clevedon event.
The contest was the inspiration of Isabel White (no relation), founder of a poetry performance collective, Alarms and Excursions, and a poet with more than 20 years’ worth of credentials and accomplishments. She also has been a Motown fan since the mid ‘60s, “and instead of studying for exams, I was out three nights a week clubbing and frequenting London’s finest: the Marquee Club, the Cat’s Whiskers, the Whisky A’ Go Go and many more.” Isabel asked me to join the judging panel, and ultimately, “Dance in the Light” by Dennis Johnstone emerged as the outstanding work.
It was a difficult choice, given the calibre of many of the 100+ entries. “We were delighted,” said Isabel, “with the spread of entrants from all over the U.K., the U.S., Ireland, France and South Africa — which just goes to prove that there’s still a universal audience for this music.”
First and foremost, though — congratulations to Dennis Johnstone. And, without further ado, here is “Dance in the Light”:
There were lines in the crowd, there were ropes at the door,
Kept the black from the white like it had been before,
But the bass hit the beat and the voices took flight,
And the kids broke the chains when they danced in the light.
Didn’t know they were changing the world that they knew,
Didn’t plan for a march, just a song they could could move to —
And the sound kept on rolling, hearts were unchained,
And the feet kept on moving, love still remained,
And the hands came out reaching, stood side by my side,
And the world began dancing, free souls in the light.
From the streets of Detroit to the juke joints down South,
Where the voices of freedom had fear in their mouth,
They were told, “Stay apart,” but the groove was too strong,
When the bassline was kicking, the hate didn’t belong.
Didn’t need any banners, no words to defend,
Just the backbeat and soul made the walls start to bend.
And the sound kept on rolling, hearts were unchained,
And the feet kept on moving, love still remained,
And the hands came out reaching, stood side by my side,
And the world was still dancing, free souls in the light.
Now the tides want to turn, push the clocks to the past,
Tell us love didn’t matter, say the dream didn’t last,
But the groove never fades, and the truth still remains —
When the music is playing, we all feel the same.
Ain’t no colour in the rhythm!
”Ain’t no chains upon the song!”
Ain’t no walls around the feeling!
”We’ve been singing all along!”
And the sound keeps on rolling, the hearts are unchained,
And the feet keep on moving, the love still remains,
And the hands stretch out reaching, stood side by my side,
And the world is still dancing, it’s soul in the night!
For maximum effect, you might want to read the poem aloud.
“Much of my poetry is about survival, labour, endurance and resilience, refusal, exploitation, and the corrosiveness of privilege,” Johnstone told me after “Dance in the Light” won the competition’s first prize of £1,000. He added, “I’m reluctant to say my poetry is about civil rights, but it absolutely calls out the abuse of power in all its forms. For me, that’s the heart of Motown.”
Dennis Johnstone: a ‘Light’ touch
For me, the heart of Johnstone’s poem was how it summoned, both directly and indirectly, the reality which the young singers and musicians of Motown experienced in the early 1960s. Smokey Robinson, for one, referenced that in his autobiography, Inside My Life. “Following the southern [concert] route was hell,” he wrote. “Most hotels were hostile to blacks, so you’d be stuck in funky boarding houses on the wrong side of the tracks. You had to watch what you said, how you looked and where you walked.” Otis Williams of the Temptations remembered segregation when the Motortown Revue played in the South. “From the stage,” he recalled in his memoir, Temptations, “you could look out across the auditorium and see a rope running smack down the middle of the aisle: blacks on one side, whites on the other. Same thing for the balcony. We couldn’t believe it.”
And yet such prejudice was essentially made irrelevant – indeed, it was, in time, widely banished – by the overriding power, depth and universality of the music created in that basement studio at 2648 West Grand Boulevard, Detroit.
Johnstone himself is a self-described “Australian drifting through Scotland.” Growing up in his homeland, he listened to Motown “behind closed doors because it was seen as ‘black man’s music’ or worse. Racist slurs were common, and it definitely wasn’t something I was allowed to listen to.” When he was older, Johnstone saw Diana Ross and Stevie Wonder in concert in Australia during the 1980s and ’90s. “I don’t recall many other Motown artists touring Down Under. I prefer the original Motown Sound – up to 1972, ’73 – so it’s actually the recordings that matter most.” Gladys Knight & the Pips sit high on his list of favourites, as do Jr. Walker & the All Stars (“ ‘Shake And Fingerpop’ is blasting from my speakers at this instant”) and Tammi Terrell with Irresistible.
“So when it came to writing ‘Dance in the Light,’ there was a lot of personal history behind it. I wanted to capture the energy and groove of Motown, but also its spirit of resistance. That’s what Motown meant to me growing up. That’s what it still means to me now.”
Judging notes: there were two others recognised by “motorcitysixty” (that anniversary is of the Tamla Motown tour of Britain in 1965): Tom Stockley, runner up in the main competition, and Ruth Davies, who wrote the best submission from a poet local to the Clevedon area. Stockley’s contender was “Multicoloured Blues,” while that of Davies was “Jukebox on the Pier.” The so-called “sifting judges” who reviewed all the contest submissions before the final stage were poets Mark (Mr. T) Thompson and Steve Tasane..
Poet notes: Dennis Johnstone’s long-established website can be found here. “I am,” he writes, “from paths that stretch further than reason can see/From the hands worn to leather by toil and machete/From the red dust that clings like the ghosts of the past/From the swarm and the storm, from the first to the last.” And on YouTube, he reads “Dance in the Light”…