Too Late So Early

I Sang “Damn” in Church

On Monday night, I sang the word “damn” in Asbury United Methodist Church in Atlantic City.

The annual community Thanksgiving interfaith service, postponed a week due to a power outage in Atlantic City, was attended by seven clergy, ten members of Shirat Hayam, barely a handful of others, and some Beth El congregants on Zoom.

The program included psalms by King David, a presidential proclamation, prayers or poems by Amanda Gorman, Mary Chapin Carpenter and Debbie McDaniel, a couple of hymns (We Gather Together, America the Beautiful), a repurposed Broadway tune, a homily, and one of my original songs.

I explained how the song — Too Late So Early: July 6, 2022 — came about. Not long into the lockdown, Ellie’s four siblings, with spouses/partners, and her parents held weekly group calls on Zoom. One early summer evening, toward the end of the call, the discourse had turned a bit raunchy. I made a show of looking at the watch I wasn’t wearing and said, ‘Oh my, it gets late so early!” Meaning, time to go! We all chuckled and said goodnight. I recognized that my quip might be worth saving; you never know.

For me, July 6, 2022, was a dark day. The Uvalde school massacre was still fresh when the Highland Park, Illinois, killings occurred on July 4 (for both, as usual, officials were looking for motives and offering thoughts and prayers, while not taking preventive action); eleven days earlier the Supreme Court had overturned Roe v. Wade.…

It seemed that nothing good was happening anywhere. I was compelled to write a song, and the first words that came to mind were, “Gets late so early.” Now, though, it wasn’t a quip; there was so much darkness it was hard to glimpse any light. But I had to try.

Too Late So Early: July 6, 2022 (©Jonathan Kremer. All rights reserved.)

Gets too late so damn early these days.
We are stuck in a purple malaise

that obscures and confuses, everyone loses.

Gets too late so damn early these days.

Gets too late so damn early these days.
Hope our kids keep their innocence phase;
but the news is so loud, can’t hide from the cloud.
Gets too late so damn early these days.

Late for law, late for justice, for rights.
Too late for lives changed by bullet, by fright.
We’ll climb out of the dark, light a match, strike a spark,
raise a torch that will blaze through the night.

Not too late to break out of this maze.
Make it better together, there’s ways
we can be the new dawn before it’s all gone …
Gets too late so damn early these days.

(This will be on my forthcoming CD of 13 original songs, Nobody Told You. You can listen here:
https://jonathankremer.com/nobody-told-you)

After the service, we had fellowship and light refreshments in a side room of the church.