Notes About The Poem
The B Side Man
Daniel Henry Rodgers
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"Every forgotten song carries the weight of the man who wrote it
for there’s a kind of truth only the B side will tell you."
- Poet
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The B Side Man
I was cut in the studio after the hit had dried its sleeve—
a shadow-track pressed in wax
buried under the melody that crowned them kings
I came with the needle's sigh,
not for applause,
but for the noise you never chose.
The A-side spun through summer air—
windows down, girls laughing loud
boys riding every chorus like a dare.
Me?
I cracked my voice in backrooms
where the arm hung heavy after the party died
currents of sound tugging me out like undertow.
And I spin facedown, slow, unseen—
a ghost beneath their diamond sheen
He gets the lights, the girls, the stage
I fade into the paper's age.
Round and round the vinyl turns—
the B Side Man forever burns.
At sixteen I carved her name in desk-wood grain—
she mouthed his chorus down the hall
while my poems powdered into leaf-dust
"Keep me close," she said
eyes clear enough to look through.
That's when I learned love was just the sound
of someone else's record spinning round and round
and I was only cut for the space between the songs.
Teachers called me "thoughtful, deep"
but never dropped the needle long enough
to hear the whole refrain
Jobs came and went—
I was the ghost understudy
who never made curtain call.
A cracked guitar pick in my pocket
a paper sleeve softened by rain—
keepsakes no one keeps.
(Bridge — imagined rebellion)
For one heartbeat, the room floods with lights—
her hand in mine
my song running wild on every station
I take a match to his master tape,
drag the diamond through his polished groove.
The crowd roars—
Weekly Top 40, number one—
then pop—hiss—skip—
and the room goes cold again.
Don't lift the needle—let me die through
There's something honest in the warble
a truth too raw for the charts.
I crowned another man to hide my dust-filled frown
I held the ring, I fixed the tie
smiled when they kissed—my rehearsed goodbye.
They chose the stars, I swept the floor
forgot the voice I had before.
And I spin facedown, cracked, erased—
my sleeve unprinted, my track replaced.
No charts, no fame, no memory—
just dying vinyl lost at sea.
Now silver-haired where gold once shone
my grooves are dust, my name long gone—
I've kissed the air but not the lips
danced alone on sinking ships.
The tide still pulls where I once danced
still turning in this dead romance.
Who was I before the scratch?
The name escapes my warped dispatch—
a soul erased without a trace,
a spindle buried in its case.
They tell it now in backroom bars—
old bandmates, one woman with grey in her bun
a collector swearing he found my single
split clean down the center
fingerprints dried in the crack.
A side, B side—
both lost to the sea.
So if you're spinning on the edge,
don't think the tide can't take you.
One day you'll hear the pop—hiss—skip—
and the room will go cold.
And I spin facedown, slow, undone—
the forgotten man, the nameless son
Round and round through hollow night—
the B Side Man fades out of sight.
Round and round, the silence grows—
The B Side Man nobody cared to know.
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