More Nostalgia

 

MORE NOSTALGIA

(Another photo from the archives)

My godson, Mike, just phoned us

So I'm sending this to him,

Although my memories of the event

 Are growing rather dim.

This was Michael's christening

And I was twenty-one.

He has now retired

And simply living to have fun.

He is over sixty;

His baby clothes don't fit.

As for me, now eighty,

I haven't changed a bit!

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IN THE BEGINNING

In the beginning was the sound.

The only instruments were

The ground upon which water dripped,

The rock against which fingers tapped,

The creak of the branches

One against the other.

Men heard it and were glad.

For rhythm

Was the essence of life itself.

They felt the rhythm within themselves,

And feet began to tap,

Hands to clap,

Fingers to click,

All in time to the rhythm.

Instruments came later.

And the instrument

Most closely recalling

The primitive rhythm

Is the guitar.

For only the guitar reinvents

The primeval accident.

The sharp metallic sound

Of fingers and strings

Interchanging,

Seems elemental and chancy.

The notes are modern,

But, between the notes,

Falls the primitive accident.

Serendipitous sound

Litters the world

In which the Guitarist plays.

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