Music and Morality (Color Poem 3)

Music and Morality

     Black and White

My fingers slip along the keys

in front of me.

Smooth, and yet

my hands

trail salty, sticky sweat

on each key I trace.

People are looking at me –

people I know

and people I don’t.

          Anxiety;

I imagine the black pupils

and whites of their eyes

like the keys of the piano,

ebony and ivory.

     No.

          Focus;

I have to focus.

The keys under my skin are separate

like angels dressed in white robes

lying parallel to devils

smothered in black feathers.

I see them bicker as I hear

the tinkling chords hammered down,

painting the world

          in black and white,

          up and down,

          right and wrong.

Every breath I take in

is like a shudder from my core.

I feel my body reverberate

with the same vibration

emanating from each of the strings.

           Wrong.

               Not disconnected.

     Yes,

the music is made with the blend

of obsidian and cream.

Everything around me blurs,

from the stage to the rafters overhead,

and I am finally pulled

into the melody my fingers are conducting.

Even the lines between the keys

blur and I can no longer feel

the eyes trained on me

or the white, stage light on my back.

Black and white becomes grey –

          grey like the sky after it rains,

          grey like the old, silent movies in the 20’s

          before technology could handle the world in full color.

And the greyer the keys become,

the more clearly my music resonates

     within me.