Mose Allison, he plays it like it is.

I love the "notes" on the sleeves of old records.

According to Mose, "Transfiguration of Hiram Brown Suite" is a serio-comic fantasy based on a perennial theme. Hiram Brown is the naive provincial who dreams of a life of opulence in the city. He goes there, is overwhelmed and disillusioned, longs for his youth, realizes that this too is an illusion, despairs, goes through a crisis and is "transfigured". This is Mose's own interpretation. He hopes that this Suite can be enjoyed from a variety of viewpoints and, most of all, that it swings. - Teo Macero

It had been a long time since they had sat at the same table. He said he felt out of sorts - a little queasy with apprehension. She drank coffee, he drank tea. An Afrikaans expression crossed her mind: koeitjies en kalfies. For a while they spoke of small cows and calves. That is to say of things that didn't bear weight or importance. Music. People. Four tears were almost shed - one from each eye, but only because she spoke with longing about his children.

They shared a messy sandwich.

He gave her the record and they said goodbye on the street.

After that he sent her a message:
I thought I had lost you.

She didn't write back, but if she had, it would have been to say: It's a combination. You have, and you haven't. This, now, is something else.
 
She remembered reading years ago about a choreographer, she couldn't recall his name. He spoke about the people he had met in his life - a succession of friends and lovers. He ended by saying: That's life, that's love, that's the world. It had angered her. But that was when she'd believed in the myth of one true love.
 

There was a time when even her skin hurt from missing him. Around her were holes in the shape of him. But as she looked at him across that table, unblinkered, she saw not the centre of a universe, but a man.
A man of flesh and blood and bone.