As I watched Bruce Springsteen play the Super Bowl this year I was struck by how much he is the quintessential American singer and songwriter.  Bob Dylan was Woody Guthrie’s heir when history called upon him in the 1960’s and I believe that Bruce has worn that mantle for some time now.

 

His songs are full of the yearnings and hope of the American everyman.  I remember in the ’80’s that the Reagan campaign used one of his songs.  Born in the USA was intended as a statement about the shameful way our government was neglecting Vietnam era vets.  (Some things never change!)  Reagan was using it as a jingoistic call to patriotism.  Perhaps this is why Bruce has made himself available to Democratic and progressive causes.  He understands that there is no such thing as being apolitical.

Bruce is one of the few artists who can articulate us as east coast jersey boys (and girls) and also as Americans who would say, “I didn’t cross the border, the border crossed me”.  Springsteen has a broad and evolving understanding of the American story, a story that includes people within and beyond the borders of the US of A.

I have been catching up on the album Dust and Devils.  I can’t listen to Matamoras Banks without being brought to the verge of tears.  We lived in Houston for close to a decade in the east end.  A neighbors were most often undocumented workers and economic refugees.  It was the food, tennis shoes, and schooling for their children that brought them and after working for what seemed to be at least 60 to 70 hours a week they would celebrate with friends, bar-b-que, and beer.

Sometimes I would join them.  Our conversations might go something like this:

Arturo:  In my country Madonna is very, very good singer.
Chuck: La cerveza Chihuahua is my buena!

Our children would be together, all of them of toddler age and mostly engaging in parallel play.  Every once in awhile they might have a conversation that went like this:

Chipper: Yes!
Jaime: No!
Chipper: Yes!
Jaime: No!
Chipper: Yes!
Jaime: No!

Then they would figure out how to share.   Would that the rest of us could catch up.

I will post the lyrics to Matamoras Banks with you along with Bruce’s preface.

"Matamoras Banks"

(Each year many die crossing the deserts,
mountains and rivers of our southern border
in search of a better life. Here I follow the
journey backwards, from the body at the
river bottom, to the man walking across
the desert towards the banks of the Rio Grande.)

For two days the river keeps you down
Then you rise to the light without a sound
Past the playgrounds and empty switching yards
The turtles eat the skin from your eyes, so they lay open to the stars

Your clothes give way to the current and river stone
'Till every trace of who you ever were is gone
And the things of the earth they make their claim
That the things of heaven may do the same

Goodbye, my darling, for your love I give God thanks,
Meet me on the Matamoros
Meet me on the Matamoros
Meet me on the Matamoros banks

Over rivers of stone and ancient ocean beds
I walk on sandals of twine and tire tread
My pockets full of dust, my mouth filled with cool stone
The pale moon opens the earth to its bones
I long, my darling, for your kiss, for your sweet love I give God thanks
The touch of your loving fingertips
Meet me on the Matamoros
Meet me on the Matamoros
Meet me on the Matamoros banks

Your sweet memory comes on the evenin' wind
I sleep and dream of holding you in my arms again
The lights of Brownsville, across the river shine
A shout rings out and into the silty red river I dive
I long, my darling, for your kiss, for your sweet love I give God thanks
A touch of your loving fingertips
Meet me on the Matamoros
Meet me on the Matamoros
Meet me on the Matamoros banks