Maybe Elvis

With hindsight, I can see that we were foolish,
but it was easy to get swept up
by the moment,
and to believe.

Looking back of course, it’s easy to work out,
but I was there when it happened
and there was nothing anyone could do
but go along,
and for a moment,
to believe.

Somebody shouted out, ‘It’s Elvis!’
A hundred eyes were turned
to the sound.
Almost everybody knows that Elvis
is gone,
but we all turned around,
and more than one of us believed,
for just a moment,
maybe it was Elvis.

I know that we were, all of us, quite foolish.
It only took a moment in the crowd.
I suppose that there are lessons
to be learned
about payment of attention,
but for a moment I believed
I saw a sequin flash and disappear
inside ‘Aladdin’s Cave’,
just behind a knick knack shelf,
in a fast moving hint
that

maybe I saw Elvis.

© Frank Prem, 2000

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