The late, great Levon Helm of The Band inspired many, including poets. Read below Tracy K. Smith’s poem Alternate Take: Levon Helm, and then watch what Smith meant about Levon in the last stanza of the poem.  Helm passed away 15 months ago and is still sorely missed. RIP Levon.

Alternate Take: Levon Helm
by Tracy K. Smith

“I’ve been beating my head all day long on the same six lines,
Snapped off and whittled to nothing like the nub of a pencil
Chewed up and smoothed over, yellow paint flecking my teeth.

And this whole time a hot wind’s been swatting down my door,
Spat from his mouth and landing smack against my ear.
All day pounding the devil out of six lines and coming up dry

While he drives donuts through my mind’s back woods with that
Dirt-road voice of his, kicking up gravel like a runaway Buick.
He asks Should I come in with that back beat, and whatever those

Six lines were bothered by skitters off like water in hot grease.
Come in with your lips stretched tight and that pig-eyed grin,
Bass mallet socking it to the drum. Lay it down like you know

You know how, shoulders hiked nice and high, chin tipped back,
So the song has to climb its way out like a man from a mine.”