Tympani Poems

Grown Ghostly

Grown up gaunt and ghostly?
Forlorn, forgotten, few.
Holy is the host? Well, see...
Day of wrath, thy dew.

Warlord, hold the highest ground?
Strongest in the sound!
Giant, issue from thy mound!
Blight them with thy bound!

Tyrant of the battlefield?
Come back on thy shield?
Only if the wound's unhealed!
Thunder, how you pealed!

Mercy? Full the harvest moon!
Tympani, thy tune!
Rampart castle, cast the rune!
Bane, bone, bind the boon!

Epic end to story?
O human race, take heed:
Morning, hast thou glory?
Prisoner doomed, just plead...

Bad? Give over what you had?
Storm gods, send thy cloud!
Make the devil mighty glad!
Burial, thy shroud...

Description, Dash

Sun dog, sign.
Belladonna, breaker point, fine wine.
Deign? Design.
Grimace, Guelf, and Ghibelline.

Young? Yes.
Grind gears, golden guess.
Torment?
Foment... Wilt, flower.

Master of Fate!
Fortune, ply pace. Lower the rate.
Petrichor.
Soar, heart within. Love, adore.

Forge? Pore?
Abyss, chasm, gorge.
Ravine.
Stranger, thy mean scene.

Meter? Reader.
Bottle, classic cola, fast cars.
Greeter? Leader.
Out on Mars they counted stars ..

Codex.
Manual, inform.
Quahog.
Quagmire escape, ape.

Tympani, roll.
Backward black, somewhere in time.
Dole? O'er soul?
Cumbersome cucumber, coal.

Storm, reel.
Elysians, feel. Heal.
Night? Sight...
Hurry to do, seal.

Ultra-Viral

Ultra-Viral

In Your Uncorporate Ether
A Waterfall
A Well
A Delta
A Shore,

Weaves Webular 'Pon 
 Retained
  Shadowy
   Time
Through Forests
And Echoing
Tympani Hearts

Now Muted.

-Gray Squirrel

06-01-2025

Tympani Tenebrous

Tympani, beat tremendous!
Like thunder roll above!
Dark matter a-tenebrous;
Knowest thou of love?

Ah, young master. In good time!
Riddles, rivers, rhyme!
Griddle, fiddle, sugar, slime.
Covert cold cut chime.

All right, sir, but in earnest;
Full, brass bull, trull, wool?
Summertime, hot clime, addressed!
Roundabout red rule!

Well, it's you two! Black and Blue!
So, what else is new?
Eggs a-light, serpents a-few?
Kittens blind that mew?

Knights of the nebula pond!
Elders strong and wise...
Mighty warlocks, wave thy wand!
Prize? Between the eyes.

Adepts of tomorrow!
Always? Skies and greys.
Surcease, students, all sorrow.
Living for todays!

Miles are marked for travelers?
Yes, and reason thus:
Reality whirs, then blurs.
Black and Blunderbuss.

Rain, pour poems on prophets.
Nerves heal as they warp.
O floodwaters, try Tophet's.
Sailors, tamp the tarp...

Drum Beat

Enticing beat,
ancient accolades, achieving ancestry
 backbeat barrage, buoyant beats
crescendo chorus  calculations
 dulled dirges, double drumming durations
environmental echoed egos
 faint, fading fervent falsettos;
Ghost-Note grooves
 hi-hat hoop heads hued
intended isolation idio-synchrony
 jembe jaunt journeyings
kidi kick knockings
 linear lick loggings
metronome mallets magical
 nostalgic notations neurological
ostinato off-beat odd-modulationss
 paradiddle  percussive permutations,  
rudimentary rack repetitions, relentless rolls,
 soft solitary shakers, steady shredding, single stroking spurs,
tenacious, tribal tectonic tympani trance 
 udu utterance 
 vibraslap virgin, vivid vibes vile,
 wood-block whirls winging wild 
xboba, x-hat, xaern
 yearning yugen yarn 
zigzag
 enticing beat.

If I Was the Rain

If I was the rain
I'd be wary of
...friends like me;
one of those
"fair weather" friends
who curse my 
unexpected arrival
on inopportune days
-but then cajoled and
praised when needed.

If I was the rain
would it be wrong for me
to feel used when
I am welcomed in the one
and shunned in the next?

At sad times I'm told
I contribute to the pain,
but then, a work of wonder,
as I meander on the window
or a tympani of pitter-patter
tapping on the roof.

I would just want to be me - and alone
if I was the rain...

Waves Crashed Within My Veins

~ This poem is written in the 8686 syllable count style of one of my favorite Emily Dickenson poems, 'I Felt a Funeral in My Brain.'


'pon roiling sea a fierce storm brewed
  waves crashed within my veins
fueled by heady winds, they pursued
  to drown my life with rains

With tympani beat, thunder roared
  bold lightning flicked and flashed
we pulled, we pulled, oh how we oared
  with nature's ire we clashed

Then came a clamor from astern
  our ship had split in two
in my veins, swells still pound and churn
  until the moon breaks through

Calmed now, the vile tempest from Hell
  sky riveted with stars
Man holds no power to dispel
  nature's wrath when she spars

~ For Chris

Cosmic Concerts

There are concerts in the sky
playing cosmically on high—

be they grouping in formation 
or harmonious creation,

fashioned synesthetically,
astro-energetically,

with conclusion or collusion,
stellar scenes in grand profusion,

gravitationally steady, 
starry outbursts brilliant, heady,

like orchestral symphony
from the brass and tympani,

viols, woodwinds, (theoried strings),
to the charms a keyboard brings—

measureless concerti vast
merging present with the past

seamlessly, or so it seems,
as in firmaments of dreams…



~ Harley White




* * * * * * * * *


Inspiration was from “Cosmic Concert for GAM 2017” which was livestreamed with composer Giovanni Renzo, described as “a collection of compositions and improvisations conceived as a visual and poetic exploration of the universe…”

Inspiration also came from the article, “Galactic Wreckage in Stephan’s Quintet”: “A clash among members of a famous galaxy quintet reveals an assortment of stars across a wide color range, from young, blue stars to aging, red stars.”

Maestro

I slip in unobtrusively 
and take a seat in back,
the orchestra is tuning up, 
I open up my pack
and take a rolled up magazine 
with which to play along,
conducting is a passion
I have had since I was young.

The brass, the woodwinds and the strings,
the tympani and all,
play scattered notes and splattered tones
until the maestro's call.
The program is Stravinsky's 'Rite,'
an overture by Brahms,
and there am I gesticulating
wildly with my arms!

A cello player noticed me
and signalled to the Man,
"Come, make music! Step on down
and join this merry band!"
the maestro cried in strident tones,
then summoned me on stage,
with great excitement I obeyed,
as he turned back the page.

"From the beginning!" he enjoined,
and handed me the stick,
I tapped the podium and stared,
I started feeling sick!
But then the downbeat... hell broke loose!
the orchestra responded,
Damn! I guess I nailed the Brahms! 
how glorious it sounded!

It was then that I awoke,
my closet was a tip,
I stood in my tuxedo
with a poker in my grip!
The famed Chicago Symphony 
with Solti in the lead,
how graciously he'd chosen me!
what better dream indeed!

Maestro

I slip in unobtrusively 
and take a seat in back,
the orchestra is tuning up, 
I open up my pack
and take a rolled up magazine 
with which to play along,
conducting is a passion
I have had since I was young.

The brass, the woodwinds and the strings,
the tympani and all,
play scattered notes and splattered tones
until the maestro's call.
The program is Stravinsky's 'Rite,'
an overture by Brahms,
and there am I gesticulating
wildly with my arms!

A cello player noticed me
and signalled to the Man,
"Come, make music! Step on down
and join this merry band!"
the maestro cried in strident tones,
then summoned me on stage,
with great excitement I obeyed,
as he turned back the page.

"From the beginning!" he enjoined,
and handed me the stick,
I tapped the podium and stared,
I started feeling sick!
But then the downbeat... hell broke loose!
the orchestra responded,
Damn! I guess I nailed the Brahms! 
how glorious it sounded!

It was then that I awoke,
my closet was a tip,
I stood in my tuxedo
with a poker in my grip!
The famed Chicago Symphony 
with Solti in the lead,
how graciously he'd chosen me!
what better dream indeed!

Alas a Pasta

Salubrious antipasto
Trimmed to be vociferous
Left without the tympani
Holding up a symphony
Greased well guaranteed articulate
Inundated synchrony
Molded into ebony
Gone on before the starting gate
Innate
Careening toward a screening
Where is all this the leading?
A gracious over-seeding
All sliding towards a feeding
In generosity I ate

At the Concert

AT THE CONCERT

the magic moment
in that silence just before
the maestro’s down beat

when the tympani 
begins a soft roll
and the trumpets rise

just before contact
his bow about to touch down
this awesome silence

the last minute cough
those surrounding very still
la traviata

Maestro

I slip in unobtrusively 
and take a seat in back, 
the orchestra is tuning up, 
I open up my pack 
and take a rolled up magazine 
with which to play along, 
conducting is a passion 
I have had since I was young. 

The brass, the woodwinds and the strings, 
the tympani and all, 
play scattered notes and splattered tones 
until the maestro's call. 
The program is Stravinsky's 'Rite,' 
an overture by Brahms, 
and there am I gesticulating 
wildly with my arms! 

A cello player noticed me 
and signalled to the Man, 
"Come, make music! Step on down 
and join this merry band!" 
the maestro cried in strident tones, 
then summoned me on stage, 
with great excitement I obeyed, 
as he turned back the page. 

"From the beginning!" he enjoined, 
and handed me the stick, 
I tapped the podium and stared, 
I started feeling sick! 
But then the downbeat... hell broke loose! 
the orchestra responded, 
Damn! I guess I nailed the Brahms, 
how glorious it sounded! 

It was then that I awoke, 
my closet was a tip, 
I stood in my tuxedo 
with a poker in my grip! 
The famed Chicago Symphony 
with Solti in the lead, 
how graciously he'd chosen me, 
what better dream indeed!

Maestro

I slip in unobtrusively 
and take a seat in back,
the orchestra is tuning up, 
I open up my pack
and take a rolled up magazine 
with which to play along,
conducting is a passion
I have had since I was young.

The brass, the woodwinds and the strings,
the tympani and all,
play scattered notes and splattered tones
until the maestro's call.
The program is Stravinsky's 'Rite,'
an overture by Brahms,
and there am I gesticulating
wildly with my arms!

A cello player noticed me
and signalled to the Man,
"Come, make music! Step on down
and join this merry band!"
the maestro cried in strident tones,
then summoned me on stage,
with great excitement I obeyed,
as he turned back the page.

"From the beginning!" he enjoined,
and handed me the stick,
I tapped the podium and stared,
I started feeling sick!
But then the downbeat... hell broke loose!
the orchestra responded,
Damn! I guess I nailed the Brahms! 
how glorious it sounded!

It was then that I awoke,
my closet was a tip,
I stood in my tuxedo
with a poker in my grip!
The famed Chicago Symphony 
with Solti in the lead,
how graciously he'd chosen me!
what better dream indeed!

The Nutcracker

THE NUTCKRACKER

Did you see it
Hear it?
Balanchine’s choreography
Tschaikowsky’s music
The New York City Ballet

Speak of dancing?
Speak of music?
Neither can describe art
It must be inwardly felt – 
     color and music extrasensory

Mathematics – Geometry comes close
You    a throbbing spirit
    centered in some rectangular enormity
The whole    pounding    awareness
Swept off in dream state

The ballerina
The toe
The grace
Quintessential feminine

The whirl    inside your skull
Spinning
Round the brain
Yet    there is a wholeness    delicacy
So levitating

Can you sense the mystery –
    what flies beyond the stage –
When all comes together
In a bold tympani stroke?

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