Springsteen’s Reflections on Life Mirror My Own

My idol Bruce Springsteen has a new album out, “Letter to You,” along with a documentary film. I caught him talking about them on A Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Can’t remember the last time I felt so inspired.

The Boss described what it was like going to the funeral of a lifelong friend from his very first band, The Castiles, formed 50 years ago. He said the experience “opened a vein of creativity” that lasted about 7 days, the time it took him to write most of the songs on his album, the first in a long while with his legendary E Street Band.

Springsteen said he’s the last living member of The Castiles, yet he still carries all his old bandmates and friends, along with his old selves, around in his head. “You’re all the you’s in that car you’re driving,” he said.

As someone just a tad younger than Springsteen who once lingered in his Volkswagen Beetle to hear every note of Born to Run on the radio when it was released in 1975 before playing his own gig at Doc Watson’s Pub at 11th and Locust in Philly, I was mesmerized. The conversation carried me to that time, and even further into the past and back again. And it inspired this poem, soon to be a song (I hope).

There’s A Crowd In Here

There’s a crowd in here

A crowd of me’s

Like a pulsing, buzzing hive of bees

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The me who cried in my mother’s arms

And the one who shouted false alarms

The boy who broke the window at school

The teen who dreamed of being cool

The college kid with his guitar

The nowhere man on the stool at the bar

~~~~~~~

There’s a crowd in here

From different ages

Like a memoir of a thousand pages

~~~~~~~

A chapter on my childhood traumas

Fighting fear in my pajamas

A chapter on my beauty queen

With a couple of chapters in between

Fighting bullies, lifting weights

Trying drugs and tempting fates

~~~~~~~

There’s a crowd in here

Walking in my shoes

Sharing all my highs and all my blues

~~~~~~~

Worshipping Elvis and his hips

Kissing a girl the first time on the lips

Learning to ice skate on Carnegie Lake

Recording his first song in just one take

Working in factories and road paving crews

Writing stories past midnight and paying his dues

~~~~~~~

There’s a crowd in here

And it’s making me whole

Strumming my heart strings and soothing my soul

~~~~~~~

Reminding me of all I’ve endured

Showing me pictures of places I’ve toured

Strengthening me through fears defeated

Mellowing me through hardships repeated

Softening me through love and giving

Making me appreciate living

~~~~~~~

There’s a crowd in here

And I’m grateful for that

~~~~~~~

It makes me a multidimensional cat

A cat who’s learned to see in the dark

Who’s old but still trying to leave his mark

Who’s graying but still poised to take that leap

Who sleeps more but still has promises to keep

A cat whose cradle has room for two

Up whose sleeve there may still be a trick or two