The Paradiddle of Being - Book Three: Just Be
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The Paradiddle of Being —
Book Three: Just Be
Daniel Henry Rodgers
"We are sheet music written in staves of flesh and steel the rest is improvisation. Civilization's clave patterns three steps forward, two heartbeats lost. The paradiddle of consciousness a right-hand reason, left-hand dream. We are flams waiting to happen just one layer of skin, one layer of soul. Each protest chant contains the herta of extinction
with a quick, quick, slow, gone."
- Poet
=======================
IX.
In the ICU, machines create their own songo—
ventilator, heart monitor, IV pump—
forming an accidental orchestra
the clutch of machinery holding time
like a hi-hat choking its own decay.
Underneath the electronic rhythms
the human body maintains its own
stubborn organic tempo—
proving that even at the edge of existence
we are fundamentally
musical beings.
The climate protestor's chant
becomes a militant clave pattern—
Save our planet! Save our planet!—
3-2, then 2-3, the rhythm shifting
as urgency demands variation—
the drumbeat of activism
learning to match the accelerating
tempo of ecological collapse.
X.
And you—yes, you reading this—
your eyes move across these lines
in their own syncopated pattern
saccading left to right in measures
of meaning-making.
Your brain creating brushed hi-hat patterns
from the friction of thought
against the snare drum
of language.
Your heart, that most faithful percussion section
has been playing the same basic rock beat
since before you drew first breath—
occasionally throwing in jazz fills
during moments of terror or ecstasy
herta bursts—three quick, one slow—
when joy demands irregular verbs.
Sometimes slowing to ballad tempo
when love finally finds the groove
you didn't know
you'd been keeping.
What moves without memory is noise—
but rhythm with ache is defiance.
XI.
This is what the drums have always known:
existence is collaborative improvisation—
we are each other’s rhythm section
the paradiddle of human connection:
reach out, pull back, reach out, reach out—
pataflafla of overlapping voices
where no one plays alone.
The fundamental pattern
underlying all philosophy, all theology
all attempts to make sense
of this beautiful, broken symphony.
The single-stroke roll of days
becomes the buzz roll of years
becomes the eternal silence
that gives meaning to all sound.
But in between—in the sacred space
between one beat and the next—
we have this: the chance to play
our part in the grand composition
to add our own ghost notes
to the ongoing improvisation
of being human.
XII.
So when you wake tomorrow
to the shuffle rhythm of morning routine—
remember:
You are both drummer and drum,
both striker and struck—
creating ripples in the fabric of reality
with every decision, every breath
every moment you choose to accent:
love over fear
connection over isolation
rhythm over silence.
The world is waiting for your solo.
The count is: one, two, three, four—
….
Play
Ratamacue—Ratamacue—
Paradiddle-diddle, Flamadiddle—
ghost notes flickering between heartbeats
syncopation staccatoed through lungs
your hands conjuring patterns
no metronome could predict.
Crash cymbal of intention—
splash cymbal of hope—
cross stick of hesitation
clutch of breath before the downbeat.
Every rudiment you call out
is a memory made audible—
a story in the language of rhythm.
Flamacue, pataflafla, herta—
let impossible syllables
tumble from your palms
like prayers, like declarations
like the secret names for joy
and to be and becoming.
The song is unfinished.
The sticks are in your hands.
You are the drum that cannot be stifled.
So play—
and let the world answer
in ratamacues of thunder
in paradiddles of rain
in the space between beats
where everything waits
to be heard.
Play on.
Copyright © Daniel Henry Rodgers | Year Posted 2025
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