NATHALIE F. ANDERSON
The bow burrs on the hoarse string, a husky whisper
whiskey-throated in the stillness: tune-up, warm-up,
try-out, space-out, that sweet moment's hesitation
before the melody begins. Then the bow turns
and the note thickens, heartens, tarries, swells, extends,
cautiously cranes its neck out, tinges, verges, bends.
No false start: here's the song itself, maybe even
a song you love well, "Carrickfergus" or "Salley
Gardens," but played now so lingeringly, you hear
every unfolding pocket handkerchief of sound,
every quivering hair's-breadth stair-step of a trill,
every unexpected sweep and sprawl. The bow burrs
and the air slows, smolders, smokes up rosin-hazy,
burrs out at the flute's mouth, blues, billows, blurs. Easy
as breathing tawny autumn, the banked leaves chafing,
their little blue tongues loosening and flickering,
the fevers raised by their trembling skirling up blue,
the sky softening, night coming early. The bow
burrs on the hoarse string, the breath burrs at the flute's mouth,
the air eases, rises, slows. Between the bracelet
and the arm, between the finger and the ring, you're
putting on that air, you're easing it in and through
the weave of your skirt, the savannah of fine hairs
on your thigh. Open your lips, that air's on your tongue.
That air's on your tongue, that air's slow on your tongue, slow
in your throat, sweet and slow in your opening lungs.
Airs and graces: hold a thing that lingeringly,
it starts to turn -- chaff buttering into sunlight,
the black berry of juniper slipping its skin,
still waters deepening into wine. The bow burrs
and the air slows, curtsies and meanders, tracing
within the long-held breath the quaver at the heart
of any whole note. Deep in your chest the blue tongues
are flickering, grace notes skirling up blue, husky
whispers fluttering. An air that slow can only
quicken. Play it again: even the dust will stir.
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