The Ghost on the Radio

About this poem

There is an incredibly fabulous documentary called “The Two Killings of Sam Cooke” directed by Kelly Duane (written by Jeff Zimbalist and Michael Zimbalist). Where they showcased Sam’s whole biography from where he started to his assassination. The reason (or at least in my interpretation) why the documentary is called as such is because Sam Cooke was incredibly influential in his time, and after his death he all but disappeared from people’s consciousness (which is the second death in question). Probably one of the most powerful songs he has ever written and recorded (and perhaps one of the most well known songs ever written),“A Change is Gonna Come”, became popularized after his death. Now, I don’t want to get into a squabble about other people’s political beliefs but when Trump became president I was very much afraid of what was to come during that time of uncertainty for my fellow immigrants (legal and undocumented alike). Sam’s song brought me a lot of comfort from the idea that , yes, even though things seem terrible at the moment “A Change is Gonna Come”. However, after watching the documentary I had this incredible sense of guilt from using this song for comfort whilst not knowing who wrote this song. Then my thoughts went to all these songs whose voices are now dead and gone and yet we still use their songs for comfort and from that came about “The Ghost on the Radio”z more »