Needless

by Peter Mladinic

It’s a song. One of the things it contains,

like a periodic sentence, is the phrase

“You’re not here.” Night before last, I read

a critic’s saying it isn’t any good, the lead,

Buddy Bailey lackluster; background pipes,

(the rest of the group), the Clovers flat.

Well, the critic got it wrong. Its laconic sound

evokes a noir mood. I woke today thinking

“I’m here,” counterpart to “You’re not here.”

In the song, Bailey and the other Clovers

singing sway around absence, something

timeless, universal. The song is 1951. Lucky

me, night before last I caught a Clovers

video, stage, stand up mics, white suits,

dark stashes, Bill Harris off to the side,

on guitar. Bailey between Matt McQuater

and Hal Lucas on “Fool, Fool, Fool.”

“One Mint Julep” segues into “Lovey Dovey.”

Jump tunes, R&B choreography subtle,

band behind them. No “Needless.”

Still, the mood’s there. All of them gone

to Glory today, band, audience, announcer

who says, Here are the Clovers. “Needless”

kicks it. “Needless” gets it done, as it did

for others when it came out. Needle

in groove, the 78 spins on the turntable.

“So needless because you’re not here.”

Peter Mladinic’s fifth book of poems, Voices from the Past, is available from Better Than Starbucks Publications. 

An animal rights advocate, he lives in Hobbs, New Mexico, United States.