Forever Twenty-one

Before I present the poem…

Although I have often written about the loss of my son, I have mostly focused on the impact of loss, which feels quite self-centred sometimes. People who didn’t know him must wonder what he was like.

A Creative Young Man

Matty had many interests over the years — free running, skateboarding, and piano — but as he matured, he developed a passion for dubstep, dance music, and music production.

I will never forget a conversation we had when he was around sixteen or seventeen. He had tried to explain dubstep to me, and I hadn’t got it at all.

‘Matty,’ I said, ‘always remember this one thing. Music is music, whether it’s a tune that springs to mind as you drift off and tune into the sound of your footsteps as you walk or as you tap your pen on the table to a beat. Sounds come together into something that’s greater than the sum of the parts. Genres come and go, come back again, or even die out, but music is forever. Never let yourself be restricted by this genre or that one. Let yourself go, and don’t be afraid to mix ideas together.’ He gave me that ‘yeah, whatever’ kind of response, and that was that.

Several years later, when he was studying in a prestigious music school, he turned around to me and said, ‘Dad, people get too bogged down with sticking to this genre or that genre of music. What they forget is that it’s all music. Music is music, and if sounds go well together, the sum is greater than the parts.’

‘Great thinking, Son. You’ve got it all figured out and sussed!’

The truth is that considering the dynamics of our relationship, I wanted to remind him that he’d learnt that from me and I hadn’t totally failed him as a father. I didn’t because the last thing I wanted him to do was reject an idea simply because it had come from me. Besides, I felt that somewhere beneath his conscious resentment of me, he recognised that I knew what I was talking about on some topics.

Attention to Detail

Matty always loved music, but he had a very particular talent. Whereas I could either create a melody or reproduce one in seconds by ear, and he struggled with that, he noticed nuances that I missed. He was a details person, a producer, and a master technician. That’s not to say he didn’t appreciate all aspects of sound, including melody, just to be clear, but he could take someone else’s work and develop it into something incredible. That’s where we were like yin and yang.

Back in the noughties, I remember telling someone how much I loved writing, listening to, and playing music, but that recording and production sucked — I hated that aspect, possibly because I had Matty’s obsession with getting things right, but I didn’t have his skills or patience.

And he appreciated and absorbed melody. When he was at that age where I was still cool, and he didn’t mind telling me, he used to listen to me singing my songs, and he loved them. I used to love that. One of the songs I wrote was X-rated, and I didn’t even know he had heard me singing it.

Mountains of Sheba

The song was called ‘Mountains of Sheba’ and was written from the perspective of a man who had become obsessed with someone mainly because of their large breasts — their ‘Mountains of Sheba’. A fellow singer/songwriter had told me I was too straight-laced and conservative, and that I should let my hair down.

Every day, I used to take a stroll with a couple of guys from work, and, well, let’s just say that the conversation wasn’t always that politically correct as we walked among the suited and booted of Leeds’ business quarter. One of them would almost break his neck following the swinging hips of attractive ladies walking by, and the other one had a mouth like a sewer. In case you’re wondering, yes, I was a saint! I was usually too busy trying to share an opinion with them both.

One of those friends used to refer to breasts as the mountains of Sheba or the flatlands of Zimbabwe. I decided to write a rap to celebrate the beautiful ladies of Leeds City Centre. What started as a rap became a very amusing song.

The narrator in the song is into this woman on the basis of looks and nothing else. In this more raunchy, explicit version of the classic song Lola, once he gets up close and personal, he realises the person he is fondling has extra bits and freaks out. I don’t sing the song these days because it could come across as anti-trans, which it isn’t. The butt of the joke is the man for being such a shallow individual.

So, while I had been singing this song, Matty had heard every word, including the very catchy chorus:

Mountains of Sheba… ahaa I want to be near her. Mountains of Sheba I am gonna be near her.

The first I knew of this was when his mother called me to tell me off while trying to stop herself from laughing because Matty had decided to sing the chorus and a couple of verses of the song to her friends and family.

Pure of Heart

Matty had a pure heart. His default position was truth. Like my mother, he was unable to lie without giving it away. With this pureness came more than a little bluntness, and if you wanted to know how he felt about anything, he wouldn’t hold back. He would have made a wife very angry if he had been given the chance — ‘Matty, does my bum look big in this?’

Idealist

He wanted to change the world, and music was his way of doing that. Every aspect of his music was designed to bind itself with the soul of his listeners and compel them to smile, laugh, move, dance, and love life. He was a technician with a passion for the science of happiness through music.

Like many young people, life, people, society, and negative experiences had not managed to beat him into submission. He had that blind faith, that naivety, the infectious idealistic perspective that many older people give up on. Nothing could stop him.

So, for my beautiful and unique Matty, here’s the poem:

Forever Twenty-one

With your film star looks and confident smile You’ll forever stay young and unstoppable Naive and ambitious Creative and brave Forever twenty-one Forever my son.

With music in your heart and a strong mind You’ll forever stay determined to change the world A bold idealist Just starting out Forever twenty-one Forever my son.

With splendid tunnel vision and breathtaking faith You’ll do it your way with unshakable resolve Certain and settled Ready for it all Forever twenty-one Forever my son.

© Martin Morrison 2023

British writer