finally, a new poem! How the lyric feels within my mouth

 

How the lyric feels within my mouth

Brightly, sun pours forth in generosity, particles of light drifting ever downward

Upon ten fingers and a smile. One, two, three, four and breathless, I play.

Once again, a magical afternoon with the traffic hurrying by, unnoticing

Of the life and death and passion occurring just a few feet away.

These old black and white keys, chords and rhythm and spaces between,

Moments of music, and- me! How sweet it is to touch the divine,

To hold it in my heart and let it run through me, notes tumbling forth,

Water in a slough, and the trees, and the stars, and the murk, and the purity,

All of nature and all of God and all of man and woman combined into:

Music. What then, is music? The food of Gods, painting upon silence, and

Pleasure, and... And this. This is how it feels to be moved. This is how it feels to dance,

And this, as I sing, today it is French and tomorrow it is German and another day

It may be Czech. And my mouth becomes Venus’ pearlized shell, curved round the top

And pink within, and the strength from the earth and that air from above and lost am I

In something almost un human (and yet oh so very) when I realize this reverberating

(something! What? What is it? It is like falling in love, and capitulating the lover,

it is like the sensation of rustling in one’s heart at the witness of a hundred parakeets

in exodus from a weeping willow in one sudden rush of terror and joy, it is effervescent

and it is) it is within me, coming from me? Nay, not from. Through. And back I am to the

through, for this is how the lyric feels within my mouth, whether I sing for la mort or

l’amour. I sing for you.

e.e.m.