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Listening to Maria Callas

by James Graham 

Posted: 23 January 2015
Word Count: 161
Summary: For this week's music challenge.


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Listening to Maria Callas

My neighbour’s van growls by
with a stuttering crescendo and a long
diminuendo down the hill. Another snarl:
a rotary percussion drill, or something,
wakes like a serpent de profundis,
performs its ugly upward slur, and whines.

Enough. I power up
my gentle engine.
Track seven. Preset.

Strings whisper like blown grasses, then the first note
breaks like a morning sun through smokeless air.

Casta Diva, she implores. O virgin goddess,
we behold your lovely face. This voice
of one who was no angel, is lovelier
than all the invisible choirs we conjure.
It falls without slur across a pensive
interval, and my tears obey. There is
no other sound in all the universe.

Spargi in terra pace, she cries out.
Sow peace on earth. When the long

last chord is breathed, then the innocent
tools and motors may repeat their tuneless tunes

but the howls and rat-a-tats of armies,
let them be now and always silent.






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Comments by other Members



V`yonne at 11:20 on 24 January 2015  Report this post
I love this James!!!

the first note
breaks like a morning sun through smokeless air.

Is just perfect. And Casta Diva? Callas? Unparalleled!
 

the innocent
tools and motors may repeat their tuneless tunes

but the howls and rat-a-tats of armies,
let them be now and always silent.

works well with  motors and players and wars! Well thunk!!!

James Graham at 19:52 on 24 January 2015  Report this post
Thanks, Oonah. 'Like a morning sun' - glad you like that, because I tried to find an aural simile comparing Callas's voice with another sound. But what sound? No sound in nature, or of any musical instrument, seemed comparable. So it had to be the sun. When I wrote the line, I was thinking, 'Well, the sun then, for want of anything better'.

One word I'm quite chuffed with: 'serpent' (line 5). To begin with, it was 'dragon', but a serpent is a rather growly musical instrument. I prayed to the Muse, and she was kind.

James.

MarkT at 11:54 on 25 January 2015  Report this post
Wow. That is some seriously great prose. Excellent work. 

Bazz at 12:52 on 25 January 2015  Report this post
A lovely moment captured here, James, I love how it unfolds at the end, quite philosophical, a small moment given infinite weight. Which is something that music is exceptional at stirring.

crowspark at 16:15 on 25 January 2015  Report this post
A deserving win.

Loved:

Strings whisper like blown grasses, then the first note
breaks like a morning sun through smokeless air.

Like the sound track of an edition of Morse, sublime moments stolen from pervading anarchy and dissolution.


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