Nina Simone

Alice Miller writes of "the child's strong tendency toward idealization, and Melanie Klein of "the early feeling of not knowing his manifold connectors...that unites with the feeling of being incapable, impotent..."

We must have believed at one time that we are born into a perfect world.

A songwriter like John Prine sings like he can't wait to get out of town, like he'd walk over glass to get there. He ignores sunlight and the one leaf that's fallen on the windshield and keeps driving and driving until the countryside becomes sweeter and sweeter and he's finally where he wants to be.

"Put your makeup on and fix your hair all pretty and meet me tonight in Atlantic City," the late Levon Helm sings, covering Bruce Springsteen's song in the best movie Martin Scorsese ever made or ever will make, "The Last Waltz."

Last night I thought, why do we need poetry anymore when we have film? I couldn't get the thought out of my mind, remembering that Octavio Paz, said, not long before he died, that the future of poetry is video.

Listening to Nina Simone always makes me feel better, not just good but better. The future of music is Nina Simone.