Rodney's First Tone Poem

 

Rodney sits at the piano in front of a fresh sheet of music paper. I can't really imagine what it's like. But Rodney can hear the whole of his score through the instruments imbedded in his brain. He writes notes like I write letters to my wife and daughter. He knows how the world inside the music differs from the world of the eyes. He writes with his vision, however, making the transition automatically from space to time. Then there is the emotional side. When he writes the emotion comes from something moving. He can see the motion, a textured point, some of it made of frozen time and some time liquid through which it passes. That is what feels, the blushing, paling, ever articulating moving point.

He rests after pushing his music up a steep hill, chugging, he is out of breath. He could feel the effort as the music tires, repeating the effort in cycles, rhythmic widening, slowly expanding. Rodney reaches the top. There is no higher in this world. He can now see nothing, feel nothing as the moment stops.

Rodney described how he returns after his rest. No longer breathless, he brings his music to the brink then tumbles it down. He feels the music release the sigh that originates in his lungs. It is a dance of relief.

I chug upward
as the air
thins, the sky
blues the stars.
Then it, at the peak,
stops. Music
is not like life.
Envisioning the rhythm of time,
when the now point arrives
there is no view.
I have to tumble
slide down
letting out
the melody
of my breath.