ManicDDaily

Cantabile

He played as if the keys were hair that had been brushed
a hundred times a day many hundreds
of days–this is not to say that the piano sounded like hair but like
much care, silk spun
into flow, flow woven
into bell, as if he rode
a length of knell–one knew he must have learned
to ride it
in the way that a stream might learn to swell
and then subside, as if he’d studied the teachings of glisten
and undertow–

Earlier in the day when I thought of practice, I thought of how you’d hardly had to work
at pretending I didn’t exist,
how quickly you perfected my nought, how
when you seemed to see through me, I even for some while
ceased to be–

And then there are words
like cantabile–
their sound paralleling
their significance–

Time is a word
like that–with both long I and silent
me–

What I mean to say is that there is always beauty
somewhere, working diligently
to come to our attention, as
we in turn strive to pay attention–
or, the opposite–
as we don’t strive
to pay anything,
as we simply listen for the hard-earned that’s learned
to be given,
as we practice listening
with all
our hearts.

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Yes, it’s weird. But it’s late in the day and late in the April game here!   Draft poem for Real Toads for a super interesting prompt by Rommy about tea ceremony.  Here I am thinking about an aspect mentioned by Rommy about much practice making for the best cuppa (and focusing on the idea of practice rather than tea.)

Cantabile is originally an Italian word, used in musical notation to mean singingly (often as a direction to a pianist to play singingly or sweetly.) Pronounced  (sort of) can-tah-bi-lay.

I will be traveling Thursday but hope to get to reading other poets soon.