PAD Day 18: Driving to a One-Hit Wonder

 Today's prompts from Writer's Digest and NaPoWriMo: (1) Write a "response" poem, and (2) "...craft your own poem that recounts an experience of driving/riding and singing, incorporating a song lyric."

I've written a few poems before on this theme, and probably my favorite poem ever about music in the car is "Roy Orbison's Last Three Notes," a Pushcart Prize-winning poem by my New Jersey poet friend B.J. Ward. You can read it here. My poem is about singing to an old R&B tune from 1974 that somehow escaped my ears when it first came out, but since I discovered it a few years ago, it's become a favorite. It's less than three minutes long, but it only needs that long to establish a memorable groove.  (The title of the poem is also the title of the song.)

Be Thankful for What You Got
 
I’m a sucker for conga drums,
and when they open this old one-hit wonder,
I’m hooked every time. The name 

of the artist and writer, William DeVaughn,
has been lost in the shuffle of music history,
partly because he left that world
and returned to his job as a draftsman.
But his groove became timeless.
 
Diamond in the back, sunroof top,
Diggin’ the scene with a gangsta lean,
Woo-ooh-ooh…
 
It’s a song about having and having-not,
and I’m somewhere in-between.
You may not drive a great big Cadillac,
it says, but you can still stand tall.
It doesn’t mean stand pat, though.
You can try to better yourself,
have a dream and find a way to get there,
without stepping on others along the way,
but don’t forget to count your blessings.
 
I’m not part of the lifestyle depicted
in the song. I don’t do the “gangsta lean”
When I drive. The driving instructor’s
“10 o’clock and 2 o’clock”
is still too ingrained in me.
But when I creep through these city streets
in my beat-up old Honda Civic
with the stereo blasting that slow-jam chorus,
 
Diamond in the back, sunroof top,
Diggin’ the scene with a gangsta lean,
Woo-ooh-ooh…
 
if someone says,
“Who’s that O.G. brotha playing that song?”
I’d like to lean out the window
with a smile, and say, “That’s me, y’all.”