Paderewski and August, 2020

Four minutes
and forty-seven seconds
deliciously
frighteningly long
the opening catching one’s throat
time and death and beauty
a moment of his life
long past
but here, now
irresistible
in my room
inside me,
music.

His sound pulls me
away from the to do list,
the debts, the bills,
this laptop, that hard drive, moving things
from here to there
did they get there
will I lose them
holding on.

Paderewski playing his composition
his fingers, his music,
the marvel of that.
a thought drifting that
this would be a song
for my funeral
those I love so dearly
knowing me then.

The pianist here, though
just now, in my room with the sun and August
the months of aloneness
my grandparents’ blond wooden kitchen table
under my arms as I type
one casual unintended click and the music has come
into this quiet heat
a song pulling me away from the rest.

His melody serene river
listening
one minute
another
how long is this
don’t let it stop.
here, this musician’s poetry
in a scratchy old recording
a melody so present
the simple journey of this man
this artist.
longing to share,
music.