RECITAL

(Illustration from the Dance of Death by Michael Wolgemut (1493)

A dance troupe
Stands in backlit fog;

The fog is fake,
But music
Makes it real.

The dancers move
As if they are
Afraid, scatter
Across the stage
To search
For a way out --
But no matter
Where they go,
We can still see them.

We feel their fear
And want them
To escape
From this great threat
That we can’t see;

The music has described it to us
Vividly enough –
but the fourth wall
still blocks their way.

If not for that,
We feel how far
The drums could
drive them;

Imagination
Takes its shape
From limits.


-- © 2010 by Jack Veasey

(All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced or duplicated in any way without the author's written permission.)

LITTLE SPARROW

(Edith Piaf, 1951, courtesy J.B. Assieu Albertini)

In Memory Of Edith Piaf


“I regret nothing,” she sang.
It was her anthem.
It is not mine,
Though there are days
when I could truly say the same.
How I view the past
Depends on where I’m standing
When I dare to think of it.

Most of the people
her voice has touched – decades
after her death –
don’t speak her language. She had
a throb that pierces
every culture’s armor.
“I don’t speak French,”
A young girl told me once,
“but I get every word she said”.

I don’t know the details
Of all that she didn’t regret, but I think
I’ve made a good guess. Many faces
I can barely picture now
Manage to haunt me
Nonetheless, at least
From where I stand today.
But I don’t regret
What songs I’ve carved
From that.

Let those who hear
Fill in their own
Echoes of faces.


-- © 2010 by Jack Veasey


(All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced or duplicated in any way without the author's written permission.)