Long Clarinets Poems

The flames of the furnace (well-travelled by wind
slowly glazing the rags of gray women chagrined
at the sight of a hair fleeing tresses now thinned) 
sometimes billow like waves flooding naves through the night,
when the lightning...

Read More

Khatia Buniatishvili's Tour de Force of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto N° 1 in B-flat minor on Zubin Mehta's 80th Birthday*

… the caged-beast terrified defying the donderbus blasts vollies of muskets and cannons heralding the charge cavernous...

Read More

Flings and wings and rings rejected…
 Cupid’s arrows fly deflected…
“It clearly is too late” she signed, “to love, adore or pay me mind”

Penciled lines drew cruel conclusions
mocking mirror’s cracked illusions…
Sometimes, in time, I hang awhile,...

Read More

Little Heidel clapped her hands
                      As she heard the marching bands
   ...

Read More

Oh captcha squares, oh captcha squares
What are these objects in your frames?
Oh captcha squares, oh captcha squares
Why must they gotta be the same?

    Cars and busses, traffic lights
    Bicycles...

Read More

Rain seeps into every crack and crevice
chilling to the bone
Winter has arrived with a vengeance 
and summer is forever gone.
Ice slicks the asphalt, into a
glittering glistening death trap.
Here begins the slow invasion 
of the unrelenting...

Read More

 Continued from Part 1 

The Beggars ’neath the balustrades,
and broken Children, Chambermaids,
are running wild from wraiths, afraid
	of dreams where death redoubles.
They fritter time with tattered threads
(from ragged clothes they’ve left in shreds),
crocheting hoods to...

Read More

The concert Band 
A work of reeds, air, and hands 
Reading sheet music isn’t easy
And our uniforms are anti-sleazy
All instruments must be in tune and time
Otherwise we sound like a broken chime

The flutes sound sweet...

Read More

Proud parents gathered for the fifth grade band presentation.
The kids labored long and hard to enhance their musical education.
'Twas the band's first concert since its recent organization.
The harried teacher approached it with a sense of...

Read More

The Parade

The sun beat down in the still May air
The streets were thronged with people there
Expectantly waiting for the large parade
As it marched its path down the Palace way

The marshal music from afar
Soon became a...

Read More

invoice number twenty seventy six
...................................................
15 violins
10 Chellos
10 bassoons
10 clarinets
5 flutes
5 tubas
10 French-horns
3 bass guitars
2 (pairs) kettledrums
2 snare drums
1 bass drum
1 chimes
1 tom-tom

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
6 heads of lettuce
1 quart of artichoke hearts
salad dressing
6 pounds of deli ham
3 pounds...

Read More

Villanelle : If you think you think and not feel your thoughts invade

	For Mozart's solo piano in Concertos Nos. 20 & 22, K466 & K482 (1785)

If you think you think and not feel your thoughts...

Read More

It was just another ordinary day
Scattered notes are all over the place
Drums trying to maintain a certain beat
Guitars either strumming or singing 

Violins studying their scales and arpeggios
The piano pouring out its player’s soul 
Clarinets...

Read More

Starving cats shriek to a full, hopeless moon
The thick air drips with decay and rank ruin
Feral dogs scream, adding pain to the chorus
Extending an invite to those gone before us

Fred Astaire and Miss Rogers they...

Read More

Encore

Cold metal touches my lips
Breathe
Fingers extend
Breathe 
Chatter from the audience
Fills my ears
Breathe
Lights from above 
Blind me
Breathe
Baton
Moves up 
Breathe
Up 
Down
Breathe
Tempo
Dit-Dit-Dit
Breathe
Drums sneer at me
Breathe
An explosion 
Of sound 
Fills the ears
Breathe
A harmony
A symphony
Breathe
Tubas 
Low and booming
Breathe
Trombones and Trumpets
Extending...

Read More

SCARLET BREEZES

Scarlet breezes swirl through the square, 
Beckoning us to come
In bright, elysian fare.
A cello and a drum, 
Clarinets and trumpets
Arise and stir and glitter in the fountain, 
Around your sable ringlets, 
In the cloister...

Read More

To harmonize within this dream

A brazen dance of cornered screams
Along a wafting, winding lane
Where melodies in concert themes
Are more than any can explain

I wander by this sad request
In minor chords and broken strings
As clarinets don’t...

Read More

.

I can feel the breath of violin, upon my face

~
                         ...

Read More

Silence expands over the steep cliffs,
the lively colors of the waves
undulate like the fingers
of a conductor leading
a harmonic orchestra of blissful faces
which execute his gestures without delay.

Violins' notes keep on rising,
trumpets make ample sounds,
clarinets follow...

Read More

THE    WATCHING    WINDOWS

City of a million windows all lit up
At the hour of  vermilion dusk
The void dims into deep violet
With great horizontal bands of inky blue-black
Clouds  -...

Read More

A Nyxian Symphony

The sun sets
My eyes close as night grows
Thoughts and dreams are lost
A soft melody starts with the twinkling of the first star
Oboes and clarinets are far in the distance
Yet their sounds echo through...

Read More

THE FIRST INVOICE
HAD A PURCHASE FOR
12 TRUMPETS
5 TUBAS
10 FRENCH HORNS
7 CLARINETS
10 BASSOONS
8 OBOES
5 FLUTES
4 SNARE DRUMS
2 BASS DRUMS
2 KETTLEDRUMS
15 VIOLENS
5 CHELLO'S
2 TRIANGLES
1 XYLOPHONE
2 BASS GUITARS
2 ACOUSTIC GUITARS

IN THE NOTE AREA WAS A QUOTE
IT SAID
 A...

Read More

A cacophony of sounds, all jumbled together
   Random notes, dissonance everywhere

Violin bows saw the air lazily, effortlessly
   Then furiously, chins pressed hard to instruments

Flautists' lips wistfully poised above the holes
 ...

Read More

ibanez, ibanez, ibanez to make her dance
french horns to tones of a bassey groove
the bassoons move the volumed effords
coupled with the flutes: the clarinets often are envious
we rather not fuss
we are smart enough to compromise
cornets...

Read More

Echoes of a sad lament

Played upon a clarinet

Creating images of strangers on a shore

Images of days of ancient yore.

As I hear the haunting melody

It's echoes resonate in me

Each note seems to echo life

The refrain brings...

Read More