DARK WAS THE NIGHT
Being black, blind,
singing and playing on street corners
through the deep south,
many nights he had no place to stay
and slept on the cold ground.
Dallas, in the winter of 1927
Blind Willie Johnson recorded
“Dark was the Night
Cold was the Ground,”
no words to this song.
It is Blind Willie moaning
with closed lips
a haunting repeated tune
in the rhythm of a prayer,
accompanying himself
on slide guitar.
No one knows if this song
was a lament for those cold nights,
an appeal to heaven,
or Jesus moaning during crucifixion.
Some say the guitar is the preacher,
his wordless voice, the congregation’s response.
In Heaven it is always day,
while, up in space -
on the way to heaven -
it is dark night
a much colder freeze
than on the earth.
Outer space is minus 455 degrees.
In 1977, the Voyager 1 and 2
spacecrafts were launched.
Each bore two identical discs
with elementary record-players,
like teenagers played 45’s on,
with graphic operating instructions for aliens.
Each record has 27 pieces of music.
#14 on Disc Number 2 lists
“Dark Was the Night
Cold Was the Ground –
Blind Willie Johnson.”
His haunting voice is now
15.6 billion miles away.
His prayer to the night
fretted by his fingers
and the guitar’s slide
from one note to another,
from one life to another life form,
his voice in space
has a place to stay,
on this Voyager
on this long night in the stars,
his wordless song
now traveling along
crying out for mercy
in this universe
at 35,000 miles per hour.
David Lauterstein, 2025
