Dylan Fest Aftermath: He Was There

Opening evening Duluth Dylan Fest 2021.
Bob Dylan Revue

One of the ongoing undercurrents of these annual Northland Dylan Fests seems to be the recurring question, "Do you think Bob will show up?" The inquiry is usually earnest but privately I find it amusing that our locally born world traveller would make his way here to spend his birthday with strangers while he has family elsewhere. He's a famously private person, so my suspicion is that if he did desire to visit his boyhood homes it would be any other time than while we're all gathered here.

Nevertheless...

One of the features of our annual Duluth Dylan Fest that is a carry over from Hibbing, is a poetry event. In the past, we've had a poetry night, but this year we had an actual poetry contest, as they used to do for Hibbing's Dylan Days.

Our 2021 DDF Poetry Contest was created and managed by Phil Fitzpatrick, a poet who also won one of those heralded Hibbing poetry contests years ago. Phil gave poets a choice between two themes for their submissions: Miles from Home or Changing Course. 

DDF Poetry event via Zoom. There's a second screen
as well. Photo courtesy Michael Anderson.

Last Wednesday the poets and attendees shared a Zoom Poetry Event in which the winning poets and runners up shared their work. Several others also participated, though these were not required to share poems on the contest themes. I believe a good time was had by all, even those who dislike Zooming.

I intended to share the winning poems here on my blog, but Phil's piece was so much fun I've selected instead to post this for your reading pleasure. For a little background, Sacred Heart is the former Catholic church which has served as home for the Music Resource Center as well as numerous concerts, including our Bob Dylan Revue and several other Dylan-themed events.

* * * 

He Was There
by Phil Fitzpatrick

“It’s going to happen”
from “Two Degrees of Separation” by  Connie Wanek

Whaddya know: finally, he showed up

snuck in the side door, dark glasses on

fedora pulled low, raggedy-ass black coat

couldn’t tell in the dark of Sacred Heart

but he might have been using a cane, to boot!

I was studying the stained-glass windows

admiring those deep reds, yellows, and blues,

the heavy-lined robes, the mournful smiles --

and that band: they were playing “Hard Rain,”

reminding me of Stockholm, Patti Smith, and all

I caught a movement at the corner of my eye

and turned quick; Mark, he was really feelin’ it,

not showy stuff like G E Smith; I scanned across

an’ above all the bobbing and nodding heads,

past Miriam and Laura jukin’ n’ jiving,’ watched

the stranger slink into the seats, like a shadow

and then slouch low and stay still as the dead,

no head swaying, no booted feet keepin’ time;

you’d never have known it was his music, his

“Maggie’s Farm,” his “You Ain’t Goin’Nowhere,”

or “Lay, Lady Lay” with Big D’s twanging whine;

an’ after Jane had soothed us with her “Born in Time,”

I looked over to watch him clapping . . . and that door,

it was just whispering closed, but I swear: he was there.

for Mark Bennett & The Bob Dylan Revue Band