(BEFORE THE DAWN)

My viol having tuned down low as deep as I am able

I softly sing along to it by evening late, dark, sable.

A player keen of pensive sombre grey moods, twilight tonic,

I want to feel under the spell of ballads old, ironic.

I play my heirloom viol to those, just those whose persistence

is by morn in nights insecure out listening to far distance…

My melodies yearn for the pallid pall and all to cover

that grew and flowered, ripened without purpose, for none ever.

And of that to have hope and an uncertain gentle notion,

yearning in heavy loam far-shored for looming germination,

seeking sound timid, delicate, the senses for deluding

like the vibrations of strong wires by mufflers dulled, occluding,

for intimacy’s sake in silent staccatos extended,

when in the lowest registers to darkness tear-filled tended…

Thus, on my heirloom viol then I play, and play then only,

while darkness still lies o’er the land, before the moonrise lonely,

and while the vigil sets austere beyond the groves and water,

and the land is in secret crossed by Holy Feast days autre.

My slender fingers on the strings twitch nervously unstable,

as I sing soft accompaniment by evening late, dark, sable…

My viol having tuned down low as deep as I am able.