I went to a chamber music concert and I was moved to write poems about the music I heard. Here are six poems from that night. I am posting them here so ask if you think that I should send them to the concert producers. Do you think they would find them interesting? Or should I just keep them for myself as mementos. Since you will not know the music, you might not find them all that interesting either. Let me know!

Listening (from Ainsi la Nuit by Henri Dutilleux)
by Nancy Williams

I’m listening with my heart
eyes lowered, breathing in…
separations, wanderings, purposeful distinctions.
I don’t want to look.
I think it might hurt.
To know this soul
would break me…

Oh, it’s just talented musicians
bathed in light
searing the silence
with hollowed-out bowls and strings
daring me to play the game
to listen, listen,
listen…
with my heart.

Now that’s Schumann! (From Piano trio in D minor, Opus 63)
by Nancy Williams

Harkening back to another century
To all that emotionality
The beauty and the beastly
Crushed and reborn, and crushed again.

Something held so dear and lovingly
Carries through piano stilettos
Breathes through open airy strings
Settles on the unfinished canvas of today.

Second movement, Opus erects us
A ladder to climb up higher
Then gaining height we look down
Upon the night that never comes.

In the third, oceans moving under
Or is that someone sleeping hard?
Breathing harmonies with the strings
Either way its beauty enters in.

In the fourth we danced
And danced some more
Till there was nothing left to say
Now that’s an ending!

After the Blast (From Cendres by Kaija Sariaho)
by Nancy Williams

It’s not so much that God isn’t there
in the late draw upon strings,
tinkelings,
and air openings,

but where
in a broken world
emptied and inside out
will he choose to settle His ashes
down
and reconfigure?

I’m sorry I asked it of Him,
just now in this winter
white with pain and ice
on frozen roses.


Climb Your Mountain
(From String Quartet in E Flat Major, Opus 97 by Antonin Dvorak)
by Nancy Williams

Go on, climb your mountain
sheep grazing, roaming free-
it’s the air up here
makes me feel a little silly
I’ll just wait a while
in the narrow lane beside the open sky.

When you come to me again
let me look into your eyes
for the echo of the waterfall
falling trembling where we lie.

Breathe on me your new impressions
of all the places you been and seen
I’ll make my own confessions
and tell you of my wanderings.

Sometimes we’ll just be bored
walking all this way together
but we’ll never loose step
when the sadness tries to enter.

Four violins and a cello
carry the blues, and us along
the ridge of meetings, endings and beginnings
where the sun never sets alone.

Go on, climb down your mountain
make yourself a path to follow
till you find yourself running
like a stallion in the dawn-

All the birds will be flying
rushing out and in
signaling your arrival
from the grasses in the wind

Carefully I will pluck the hay
from your beautiful beard and hair.
Carefully, I will pull you closer
till you stand in my shadow, and I in yours.

That will be our private heaven
our glory and our home.
That will be the end of longing,
the start of all we’ve known.


Bouncing off Emotional Tones (From Ainsi la Nuit by Henri Dutilleux)
by Nancy Williams

All this trouble
just to hear one pure sound?
Like catching a butterfly
on your antennae
as you’re driving by.

How long can it cling there
before it’s torn apart?

Slow down, stop, sit very still,
while the song moves even faster
now the notes are racing you
your wings are all a flutter-
and then you’re gone.

Or are you?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: The Troll,

I have a couple of times. but most of the music i listen to has lyrics... so i let the mood they inspire kind of fill me with the atmosphere i want to create with words... but it's hard cause... well, the musician has already done it!!

thanks for the share...

mons

Nanzar,

Like mons, the music I listen to tends to have lyrics but I've gotten that feeling to...the problem IS the fact that they've already "said it." Sometimes when I write a poem and I'm listening to a song along the same lines, I find similarities.

As for your poems, I really liked the very first one-- it was the one that I think we all could have related to the most, the way music can make you feel, how it can reach deep down into your soul with the right chords and for some people, the right words. I felt that one.

It's up to you as to whether or not you wanna send the poems to them. If you want them to know how much they touched you, I would. As for them, it's nice sometimes to be reassured that you're doing some good, touching someone.

Thanks for sharing them all.

~Gabber