The Friday Parades

By Billy Tate

On any chilly Friday when the game was here

Sylacauga came alive and excitement filled the air!

And you’d rush downtown to Hagan’s when you left the Pep Rally,

If you wanted to see the band, you had best not dally!

Then you’d stand in the street, looking up Broadway,

And you’d feel the rush of life and your hormones at play.

Soon you’d hear the drums’ cadence and their distant beat,

And your blood would start to surge from the tips of your feet!

Bright colored uniforms, bright Fall leaves;

Majorettes’ feather plumes flying in the breeze.

Now they’ve crossed the tracks and they’re coming to the light,

The Pep Squad behind them yelling, “Fight, team, fight!”

Is there anything so stirring as a drum’s tapping rattle?

They have led men off to wars, they have led them into battle.

The snare drums are louder now, the bass drum deep;

The majorettes are strutting now, the shuffle of feet.

Down at Whitley’s Barber Shop the clipping has all stopped.

The clients are on the sidewalk with their hair half cropped.

And Hollywood’s motorcycle is clearing the band a way,

If he has to move you back a bit, it seems to make his day.

Now in a flashing move horns have moved up to lips;

And the band comes alive on a rousing Sousa trip!

Well, it’s “Stars and Stripes Forever” in the canyon of our town!

The majorettes are kicking, their batons are whirling ‘round!

Tell me, do you remember Sara Ann Mims?

She was Harmon’s daughter and a majorette gem.

Dark hair, dark eyes, a figure so petite;

She set a Drum Major standard that never has been beat.

The band has now reached Hagan’s, and here they’ll do a show.

With a whirr of her whistle, the leader stops their go.

For a moment there’s a silence, and the leader’s hands are raised;

Then suddenly they fall and the band begins to play.

What a rousing tune it is! It’s another Sousa!

And loud, are they loud, bet they hear them down in Coosa!

Lithe and lively moves by our lovely majorettes;

To us they’re every bit as good as RCA Rockettes.

And male eyes young and old are rapt with adoration

At the beauty of a woman, by far God’s best creation!

With the Sousa march done and their show at Hagan’s through,

The Drum Major pauses for a moment or two.

While the band flips their music, she scratches at her nose,

And she flirts with the crowd and she waves to her beaus.

But then quickly back to business, her whistle loud and sharp,

And the band surges forward, playing “Colonel Bogey’s March”

Oh, I loved to be beside them, and hear them shuffling by!

Trumpets, tuba, trombones, it’s enough to make you cry!

And the saxes, flutes, and French horns, and the scratchy clarinets;

And that thing they hold and pong, Lord, I can hear it yet!

And let me tell you, man, if a parade didn’t getcha

You were deaf or blind or crazy or dead, I’ll betcha!