Chopin’s Nocturne in E-Flat Major

Fingers like chimes – stiff, cold, trembling,

right thumb rests on B-flat.

Its sound dangles above the audience,

begs for the G-natural a sixth up. 

His left hand falls into a twelve-eight bounce;

a fragile momentum born,

each note suggesting the next.

Trills irrigate some neglected field of mind

until he’s lost in watercolor nostalgia,

slow diminishing revolutions

- a diminuendo trickling to the final E-flat.

bar talk

Sambuca advised Midori,

Keep an eye on Three Olives Vodka,

something untrustwothy about his pink cap. 

And that frosted glass! 

Like he's got something to hide. 

Kaluha tells him to relax. 

Easier said than done, Kaluha. 

Easier said than done.

Pints

O’Donaghue’s on Merrion Square.

Head like a root beer float,

full of air on the lips, a hint of stale

but only a sliver of cloud on a sunny morning.

And that caramel finish, like the mouthful

Blew a kiss from your belly.

Auld Dub, Temple bar.

Bit unsure of itself, carries weight in the froth

like it’s got something to prove to Beamish.

Not a hint of stale or pickle smells like in the states,

and a bit of sweetness you don’t expect,

a smile from a grumpy old man.

O’Reilly’s under Tara Street Station.

Looks like the posters, a French vanilla head, 

but a bit syrupy, no air or sweetness.

Maybe the pretty girl who doesn’t trouble herself with

noticing or laughing.  Finishes rather neutral on the tongue,

but you haven’t the nerve to be disappointed. 

Murty Rabbits, Forster Street, Galway.

A friendly, easy first sip, tastes of politeness.

The head’s a bit thin, the bass a gas station coffee overtone,

but what a lovely place to sit.

Hunting

Slung pose at the piano, but who’s filming?

Looking for tonight’s lick, something to outpace memory, become more like a smell,

hard to think about but familiar - a fluent instinct, like the caveman’s.  
So like him I pound and play, open-mouthed and thirsty.  
And I think, isn’t every musician a predator? 

Every saxophone blowing lungfuls of death?  Every imagination

the cradle of dark kingdoms, which language wasn’t built for? 

How about this?  Maybe we made verbal language to try to kick ourselves out - 

shrank our universe to what toneless thoughts could put in words; it is the unsayable which haunts.
So tonight I’m hunting - every note chasing a ghost, a scabbed over emotion, a victory that only shades into lonesomeness.  

I’m coming out on the count of one! two! one! two! three! four!

and every brittle cliché I’m not living up to better duck for cover because I can play all night.

I won't worry about tonight

I chewed it slowly,

tasted and noticed,

fingered the slippery,

slippery, present moment

had a laugh and song,

and several pints.

I’ve wasted hours

scouring the past

for clues of what matters.

The past

should teach,

and let it teach

on the bus or bank queue,  

but not here.

Tonight I am happy,

not any more sure of decisions,

just a bit buzzed, less concerned,

and smelling the moment I live in.

  

If you ever go to Lowell

I’ve looked for Kavanagh along Baggot Street

and Pembrooke Road

and Mr. Yeats by the shore

down west in Sligo;

whispered a prayer and said thanks

for leaving me a bit less alone.

And if you come for me after I go,

look by a piano

creaked out of tune,

I'll be talking to a memory,

tracing its shape

with grace notes and blues.

Or a Highlands stoop

with a pink Spaulding,

letting children wonder as it’s roofed.

I’ll drift like a rumor

among their whispers,

play a joke

and ask God, please God,

save their youth. 

what is a dream?

Goals laid beyond the horizon

can’t be scrutinized or doubted.

They’re taken on faith, maybe forgotten

but the insomniatic soul will whisper

about the secret place all your world is honed to

and all the better that you don’t know where,

but that it's lovely, essential, and out of view. 

mortality

If heaven is too far to see

and hell mediocrity

won’t you please pardon me

if I never want sleep.

If bodies are dust but hearts have wings

my voice will hush when my soul sings;

I’ll dream and dream the strangest things

when I go to sleep.

Without her

            Without her

I'd never have been more

than that certain type of blue,

a kind satisfaction,

no more certain than a mood. 

I'd have groped for peace,

found borderless time

bleeding into decades,

no signposts of love to freeze

a moment in memory,

lend smell, give shape.

I'd have been interesting

to shrinking groups,  

called clever and cryptic

instead of what I was:

lonely, lost  

dull, deluded.

And now without her

I ache 

in the places she showed me,

do my best not to grind my teeth

breathe well,

chew slowly.

            

Groove

…and I don’t know why

I can’t keep still

my movement is a vessel

that’s holding my will,

soullessness is a symptom

and rhythm is a pill,

and I don’t know why…

Mozart's joke

Mozart’s notes
complete thoughts I never had,

as if he posed
a question
out of concern
for my opinion,

then answered himself

in triplets of laughter
at my future indecision.

need nothing else

I want to leave
my void of simplicity
and let you figure the rest out,

flat time to walk on
and mirrors to update yourself.