Anthony A. Castro                                                                                about 2,300 words

1D Oak Crest Court

Novato, CA  94947

(415)897-0305

Tcastro09@comcast.net

The Blues Is Forever

A Musical Fantasy

By A. A. Castro

It’s 2:00 AM on a cold October night.  The young man has snuck out of the plantation where he works and is walking towards the crossroads down the highway.  He’s got a guitar on his shoulder, a beat up old thing that doesn’t even look like it’s playable.  He doesn’t care.  He knows what he has to do.  His name is Robert Johnson and he’s going to be the greatest blues guitar player of all time.  The only thing between him and fame are his fingers; slow, clumsy things that just can’t seem to make the guitar sound like he hears it in his head.  So he’s come out here to do what the old man told him he had to do: sell his soul to the Devil so he can play the blues.

The wind is cold and it cuts thru his clothes right to the bone.  He stands in the middle of the crossroads, the guitar in his hands.  His eyes turn to the sky; the moon is full tonight and it casts its brilliance all around but there are also dark storm clouds racing across its face, clouds that cover the light and make the night even darker and more shadowy.  He thinks to himself that he still has time to go back and forget all about this as he looks at the branches swaying in the wind.  They’re bare and they look like skeleton fingers scratching a sky the color of a coffin lid.  I can’t go back to that life, he thinks to himself, I gotta sing my blues.  The clouds part and the wind dies down, letting a shaft of moonlight come down in the middle of the crossroads and bathe young Robert Johnson like a spotlight.  With trembling hands, he strums the guitar, head lowered and eyes closed.