Songstress

Never had there seemed so many hours
as lately there had been, like flowers,
all requiring music, by turns and towers.

The map of the head of the point
is convoluted,
possibly even polluted,
but in any case, inside out,
so a call came in from the tenor section,
requiring the sort of response,
by way of melodic line,
from one tonality to another,
or at least to the needed destination.

This, but one line in a fugue,
muddy, and instrumentally Moog,
guiding arrivals and departures
for all the birds of the sky,
as well as the cleanups, nigh,
of their minor mishaps,
evident all over the tarmac.

The phone rings again,
introducing yet another part,
and so the counterpoint thickens, thins
waxes and wanes into a sticky wicket thicket
—Ah, only a desperate sales call;
they had tried a dozen times before,
but perhaps the thirteenth time
will be the charm,
and the hapless caller
thinks to disarm
my brain.

Meanwhile, the music unravels
into a rubble-like rumbling gravel,
and seeks to go bounding along,
like a steam calliope,
to the circus,
as if that is truly
what should happen next.

From her cheeks to her hair,
the flames rise beyond care,
threatening to set curtains alight,
not to mention the folded laundry,
but thankfully in time to warm the dinner,
hopefully before the call goes out,
not at all for the fun,
to 9-1-1.

Please quell the flare,
and give this songbird flight
from the musical madness
of chairs in pairs,
lines and signs;
find resolution on your own,
ye dogs, cats, cars, cans and kin!

This girl needs a biscuit, some flan,
and a warm, soothing tisane.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Tower of Babel

Creation hangs on one word alone.

S’truth, one was the word, and
of one accord was the song,
by which the tower was begun.

But each ascending storey
found diversion and division.

The word splintered from one
into a world of words;
the people from friends
into nameless ranks of strangers.

At every turn, every new height
the plans and styles change;
right hand knows not left,
nor wants to.

The Witness had only to watch,
with heaviness of heart,
as the great structure
began its collapse from within.

unraveling into flames,
consternation and war.

From that time forward,
diversity has yet to discover
its sacred power to build.

No human tower shall ever reach God,
until the daughters of woman,
and the sons of man
remember that

Creation hangs on one word alone.

© 2010 by Elisabeth Eliassen