I live in a place where it feels like visiting hours are always over. A blueish light from someone else’s tv flickers through the hallway, in through the doorway left ajar. The sheet and blanket are not quite warm enough to keep the chill from your bones after the sun has gone down. The experts used to stop by to extract blood, suggests tests, to cut, remove, and transplant. These days they look at the chart, shake their heads, and talk amongst themselves, never asking how I feel or what I want. I want to be left alone but I don’t want to be alone.
Lost in thought, I had not noticed the change in the room. A bouquet of flowers had been placed on the table by the side of the bed. I lifted the card to read it. The light coming in from the street was just bright enough for me to make out the words. The note said,
We are your flowers
Breathe in the fragrance
Drink in the color
Let it surround you
We are in your dreams
And we are here now
We see you
We love you
Stay beautiful
My head sank into the pillow. I smiled. I am ready. The words echoed in my head as I drifted off to sleep…
We see you
We love you
Stay beautiful
about
A note about this song, from Damon Locks:
"An ode to Chicago: In a hospital room, doctors and nurses come in and out, evaluating, recommending, prepping, and testing. But once visiting hours are over the patient is left alone with their thoughts, ruminating on the intimidating lack of agency and loneliness of losing control of their own circumstances. Drifting towards despair, they discover flowers in the room. There is a note attached that expresses what I would say to Chicago in its most precarious condition.
“We see you. We love you. Stay beautiful.”
I am very happy to be able to share this song at this time. It is a fitting message for this moment we are living through. I hope you all stay safe."
credits
released April 7, 2020
Musicians:
Angel Bat Dawid (clarinets), Dana Hall (drums, percussion), Damon Locks (electronics, bells, voice), Arif Smith (percussion).
Dancers:
Anna Martine Whitehead, Raven Lewis (Move Me Soul), Cheyenne Spencer (Move Me Soul), Mary Thomas (Move Me Soul), Bryonna Young (Move Me Soul), Tiarra Young (Move Me Soul).
International Anthem is a Chicago-born recording company that produces and promotes progressive
media.
The IARC mission is to make positive contributions to the changing state of the music industry, and to vitalize the demand for boundary-defying music by presenting unique sounds in appealing packages to untapped audiences....more
supported by 62 fans who also own “Stay Beautiful”
Like so many others, this came like a bolt out of the blue and, even though it's well before payday, I had to have this astonishing album on vinyl to prove it exists. The feel of the tunes makes me feel like the Impressions do, Curtis Mayfield, the big spaces and instinctive horns and stuff drifting in and out. Great grooves and I can see lots of ghosts nodding along to this with big smiles on their faces. At last! Anthony Cottrell
supported by 61 fans who also own “Stay Beautiful”
My favorite artists are ones who aren't afraid to try something completely different. I hear Charles Stepney, David Axelrod's Earth Rot, Steve Reich, Penguin Cafe Orchestra and others in this, but it's undeniably Sault in the end. As usual, probably my favorite album of the year. mackro