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DANEZ SMITH Godfather for James Brown A tornado of black skin and grease dripping from your mane, mixed with your sweat, painted your face into something God would call funky, call a storm, call good. How’d make dance floors scream like their names were Sally? You better get on your good foot! You know which one. That foot that made you slide, child of grease and good hair, of blues and a woman’s scream, were you born from the dreams of sweat? Did creators make you from midnights and thunder, call it good, give you a throat that made God shiver. Your tongue made white women cry God at the thought of being even a foot away from you, Lord of everything funky and good. Bad motha . . . Something dirty in the grease that made you pretty boy covered in sweat. Boogied like lightning, thunder songs you scream into mics, the rainstorms on your forehead scream talent. Hard work. Taking what God gives and using it 10 shows a week, trails of your sweat soak Mississippi, a cater of your good foot marks every stage in the South. Stories full of grease storms, scratchy throats, wet underclothes. Damn, you were good. Something long-legged waiting backstage to give you her good night full of tangled sheets, knotted bodies, her scream. Mornings full of her hair on your chest, your grease gone. No rest, back to work, leave breaks for God. Godfather, why didn’t you rest your foot? What was pulsing in your veins that needed sweat? What made you pine for sweat dripping down your spine, did it feel good? Did it stop the twitching of your foot And make it dance? Did it scream in your hips like a black woman meeting God her first time, filled with ghost and drum, covered in tears and grease? Your sweat has dried, the grease is gone now, danced away from God, he called you home to put on good show. Missing you, we still get up on our good foot, scream for your sweat. ART ...

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