Musicians strike the Instinctive Poem²
All untapped mysteries & truths of Music
Gather into a song of Beautiful Confusion³
We don’t Sing for others: we Sing to please
Ourselves – no, not even that: we Just Sing⁴
My Bones are Frail – my Song Grinds Stone⁵
I like to Listen to Music, but only the kind you
Play – Absolute Music, the kind where you feel
Someone Rattling the Gates of Heaven and Hell⁶
Savage Music Golden Mouths are sworn to utter⁷
Not Words, but the highest coinage of human
Speech Melted down – become Pure Song,
Something Vilely, Murderously Gorgeous⁸
We maketh our own Sunrise as we Sing –
And turn the Dusty Earth to Paradise⁹
I would liken you to a Sleep without
Dreams – were it not for your Songs¹⁰
¹ Emily Dickinson, Of All the Sounds Despatched Abroad
² Wallace Stevens, The Auroras of Autumn
³ Nancy Caviale, The Song
⁴ George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four
⁵ Ghassan Zaqtan tr. Fady Joudah, Strangeness
⁶ Hermann Hesse tr. Damion Searls, Demian
⁷ Denise Levertov, Seers
⁸ Iris Murdoch, The Black Prince
⁹ Frederick Tennyson, Skylark
¹⁰ Langston Hughes, Ardella