A Lone Man

(circa 1965)

A lone man
Is a lone instrument
Playing out of context,
Limping without support.

And around each pause
Is an awkward silence,
An embarrassed inhalation,
The forced and strained pauses,
The unnatural gaps in composition.

But that moment dissolves,
And through it, a shattering rush,
Of sounds counterpoised, in balance,
A complexity of note in inspiring arrange
Floats up.

The ear is filled and content.
The heart is incontinent with awe.

Alone, mind stands,
Shivering naked in the breeze of afflatus.

- Sitaram