A few weeks ago something prompted this to pop into my head and now I can’t remember what. It definitely gave it context, I remember that much. Anyway, the show, as they say, must go on; so to compensate for lack of reasoning an alternative timeline for your contemplation follows the verse.
We all want to be
James Dean or
Marilyn Monroe
Except when it comes
To paying the bill
Would love membership to
The twenty-seven club
If only the numbers
Could be reversed
Immortality doesn’t come
To those who live long
Like Jesus on the dashboard
Of life
Christ
Built my hotrod
To drive fast and
Die young
Stay pretty
Despite all the images suggesting the contrary, Lyn and Jim never met; meaning he in fact didn’t look down her top like a filthy letch.
The closest they came being when a pre-fame Monroe worked as an usher at the premiere of East of Eden. Dean, though he was meant to, didn’t go. The world can only wonder at what might’ve been if instead he had, and in the process had been so besotted by the person shining a torch to show him to his seat, that he arranged to meet them in a little nearby diner after the film.
It’s highly unlikely this could’ve been achieved without causing a great deal of embarrassment, never mind the grievous transgression of usher-customer-outside-of-cinema-relationship protocol it would be, so it is perhaps for the best Dean decided he couldn’t be arsed to go see the film he’d just made; especially if that reworking of Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks is anything to go by, as the outcome was Bogie stealing Jimmy’s girl, while a down-on-his-luck Elvis mocked him for it!
Neither Marilyn nor James are members of the ‘Twenty-seven Club’, though both passed-away well before their times. Monroe, August 4, 1962, aged 36; Dean, September 30, 1955, aged 24. R.I.P. both.
More Poetry:
Thanks for reading 🙂
N. P. Ryan
To receive notifications of future posts of poetry—be they happy, sarcastic or sad—music history and reviews, the odd bit of this and that plus the occasional stab at promoting my books, please enter an email address below.
N. P. Ryan 