LYING AWAKE in bed in the room I share with my two sisters, who are both asleep, I play the game I have invented called ‘Take control of the deejay over at the Loyal Levi Memorial Hall’.

The Loyal Levi Memorial Hall was a school by day – Rochdale College run by Mr Tingling and Miss Burton – a Lodge Hall by night, and a dance hall on weekends and public holidays. All over the city of Kingston there used to be such multipurpose halls, and all over the city such places were filled with dance fans come Saturday night.

I take control of the deejay from the comfort and safety of my bed because I am not old enough to go dancing, but I have done this before on other Saturday nights, I know what to do. I whisper into the dark: ‘Alright now, play “Sea Cruise” by Frankie Ford.’

There is a pause as my command skips over several sets of rooftops then drops down and penetrates into the mind of the deejay. Then there is the scratching sound of the needle on the broad-faced 78 rpm record followed by a musical churning as a love boat engine stirs up the waters of rhythm.

Once I get the attention of the deejay, he often plays what I tell him for up to seven or eight songs in a row. So, after Frankie Ford sails away, I command, command Professor Longhair of New Orleans to plead: ‘Baby, Let Me Hold Your Hand’.

And after that I want, no I need, I must and am bound to hear Huey ‘Piano’ Smith tell how he has ‘High Blood Pressure’. That one is my favourite.

I love it so much that I cannot stay in my bed, so I project myself through the window and go flying over the rooftops where I hover, O yeah, and then land feet first as a ‘Bony Maroni’ dancing girl in the midst of a crowded dance floor.

I am wearing five yards of swing skirt. A hand-painted skirt, covered with scenes of Jamaica skilfully rendered by some gifted local artist. Around the hem of my skirt, cobalt-blue waves lap at calico white sands. The Blue Mountains peak near my waist. Dunn’s River Falls cascades from my left hip, a scarlet hibiscus blooms over my navel and streamer-tailed humming birds hover around my knees. Up my right thigh rises a tall and stately coconut tree. My blouse is allamanda-yellow, it has a standing-collar and is sleeveless. My fabulous outfit is completed by brand new size five ackee-seed black ballet shoes.

I have come to dance. I can spin and spin and execute that cute shuffle when I complete the whirling circle that gives me the needed momentum to push off and spin again.

Dancing girls like me spin from when the music starts till it ends. My dancing partner’s function is solely to push me gently out and pull me in again, then to grasp me suddenly, fiercely around my waist to remind me that I do not dance alone. Every time I spin, the five yards of my skirt float out till I look like a scenic 78 record spinning.

And I instruct the deejay: play Jamaican music now. Strictly yard. Play ‘Boogie Rock’ by Laurel Aitken. Let my people’s voices ride the soundwaves right there alongside Jim Reeves and Marty Robbins, Frankie Laine and Patti Page.

May I pause a minute here to say that I never did like Patti Page’s water cracker singing? That I myself would not give her even a ha’penny for that doggie in the window?

Anyway, I tell the deejay, play ‘Little Vilma’ by the Blues Busters. Lloydie and Boasie, those two fine Black princes come from Montego Bay, with their strong singing and their flawless harmonising. Play them, Mr Deejay!

Play Wilfred Jackie Edwards – what a man smooth! Play ‘Tell Me Darling’ and play Keith and Enid, who are worried, ‘Worried Over You’.

Play ‘Muriel’ by Alton and Eddy. Strictly local, this. Play what I tell you.

And after this grand sweep of lyrical nationalism please play for me the fabulous singing ladies, the ones whose voices I’ll want to conjure when I come one day to accept that I am a poet.

Mr Deejay please play LaVern Baker singing her praise song to that most able of men, ‘Jim Dandy’.

Play Sarah Vaughan, of the wondrous voice and the gorgeous slipper satin evening gowns, make her sing me a ‘Lullaby of Birdland’.

Play enchantress Dinah Washington, let her spirit guide me through the isle of joy that is Manhattan.

And play any song by the high priestess Nina Simone. For when I come to write, if I can write like Nina sings… Oh, if I could only write like Nina sings ‘Little Girl Blue’.

Play for me those ladies with voices, coloratura like Myers rum and strong Machado tobacco, mysterious as the insides of nightclubs named Blue Note and Smoky Places.

Then play Ella of the crystalline clean baptismal soulrinse singing.

This is how I play the game until I fall asleep to Dakota Staton crooning about how it all started at The Late Late Show.