You cannot know

You cannot know

Just what you mean to me.
Or how I’d hurt were you to suffer me
But see me not, unless of course you feel
Much as I do.

‘Tis no small thing to heal
My heart’s regrets with a sigh, to reach
Across the gap between our skins and teach
My soul to cry

Again. But then you’ll cut me.
That which heals also hurts. So flee me,
Fly from me when storms about me reel
Like ants drawn to a broken seal
On some great cask.

I hope that we two might each
Lean anew to hope and love. I beseech
You, stay if I am food to help you grow . . .
But if I’m poison, I pray that you will go.

October 2004

Walking

The open gate beckons my soul
into its dark solitude.
The warm sodium glow speaks of
sepia and fairies.
Victoria where are you now?
Do you look down upon your
subjects with mirth and
amusement in this later day?

Do the foibles of the people reflect or
reject the foibles of your court?

Once through the gate, that iron gate
in its limestone arch,

I choose the left-hand path.
It’s habit now, but this is the path of
darkness and mystery.
I follow it to its inevitable conclusion in
picturesque ruins.
Where else could such a path ever end?

How many paths lead this way?
How many gateways lead here?
Whose is the unmarked headstone in the West,
Past the stags and stables and gates?

October 2004

The musical life

It's been some time since last I posted here. I've tried twice in the last week or so with no success. First I attempted to respond to a quiz that witchzenka sent my way. (She's wonderful guys. Get to know her if you can.) But alas I found myself distracted in the depths of funk. Then I tried to discuss art and love and how they've been troubling me. I found that this was an exceedingly difficult proposition, and probably outside the purview of a quasi-public journal anyway, so I said nothing.

But at the absolute least, I'd like to give you access to my most recent artistic endeavors.

Study 16 is a short piano piece in a vaguely impressionist style.
Toccatta is a more extended piece in a neo-classical style. It may well be the fist movement of a piano suite.
Two works that may be further movements in the same suite are this allemande and this tempo di courante.

There's not much to talk about in terms of current news. I'm still writing music. I'm still chasing smart girls. Both have been pushed a bit further back than I would like by bills that want paying. I'll see what I can do about that, of course, but that's about where I am now. One hopes that things will improve in the fall once classes start back up.

I might perhaps try to revisit some of the more personal emotional stuff in a future post. I've been trying to decide what to do with this journal, and this might be as good a place as any to genuinely discuss my feelings and interests, as my primary goal here is to advertise myself and not my musical skills. (Though I'm always happy to do both.)

I ramble. If you have any particular suggestions or ideas, I'd be glad to hear them. Best wishes. And witchzenka, if by chance you see this, sorry I dropped the ball. I'll try to pick it up later. I promise.

Sincerely,
David

a tiny flower

I saw a tiny flower once, growing from a crevice in a face of rock.
It was in the mountains, surrounded by a world of spectacle and grandeur
so that you might almost
look past it,
small as it was.

It wasn't there for me.
It had no story.
It didn't care that I looked at it.
It simply was.

But I, being one attracted by seeing, being touched by bright colors
and strange situations,
being one who saw beauty in the struggle of the small
to express itself under adverse conditions (being myself but small,
and often feeling my own conditions to be so)
I was drawn to this flower.

And now I have its picture.
I remember its beauty, just as I remember the beauty of the
great domes of rock,
the cliffs and boulders of ancient granite,
the towering trees reacing their green branches toward the heavens,
the cascades of water
plunging from unimaginable height
to be broken into innumerable
shards before ever they reach their foot.
And I remember this flower with the same fondness that I remember trees and rocks
that were before and will be after I am gone.

Which is greatest?

Shall I compare a symphony to a waltz
Or to a five chime whistle screaming in the night for me to follow?
Can I relate a flower to ancient stone and ever changing water or
the embers of my soul?

c. 8 May 2003

I have met Bathsheba

I have met Bathsheba.

The music has fallen from my lips
And I have been sucked dry.

My soul is a rotted husk
Naked before me.

I have danced this step before,
But even if the poison has left
The hurt freezes me.

I have met Bathsheba
And the weight has fallen from my limbs
Like so much consequence.

The pain is new in every moment;
In every love.

Bathsheba is every woman
And every man
Who has felt heaven's draw.

The psalmist is every singer
Who has lost and suffered.

I have met her.
I would meet her again
Despite the withering cost.

29 January 2007