Benson

Probably enough said,

But fifty somehow beckons more.

Somehow fifty doesn't fit--

To his students he probably equals something else, something older-- gray haired sage juggling words like some barker keeping our collective attention captive on some invisible string holding the balls up in suspended motion.

Something more.

I don't really care what you are saying, Jon, just keep saying it over and over again so that maybe I can get it on the return, like that ring I can't quite reach with my outstretch fingers spinning 'round that carousel up in Spokane.  Or turning, turning, tuning the g-string (always the g-string) teasing my cowboy chord away from his home on the range--twisting logic on a six string taut to sing something we used to hear together. “Mozambique” comes to mind, or Manassas with a cigarette in Frobisher late at night when you thought about quitting school-- thank God for that community pack shoved on the shelf between Barfield and Cage, or was it Merton and Paz; Marlboro or Salem?  We were all bums when it came to smokes (Except Bill, of course…gracious source, regular or menthol?).  And what really matters is the song for singing? Speak No Evil.  Bitches Brew.  And Chet Baker in San Francisco should have counted for a year of chapel.  Hell, working the kitchen at Lone Mountain should have earned an exemption for life.  

Fifty.  

At least fifty years of questions and answers, of dialogue you bring out of those around you.  You help me find the words of my faith when a song won't do.   When someone asks me about my faith unfolding, I say, "Ask Benson." 

I can get by on the leftover scraps from his conversations--I've always been better with found objects anyway.