Nightingale & Sparrow

Author: meganrusso

  • Jogging to Reich

    Jogging to Reich

    Stuart Rawlinson

    Early this morning
    as traffic scraped the roads
    and traffic helicopters
    clogged the quiet sky,
    I ran with Steve Reich.

    Music For 18 Musicians.
    Imperial to metric and back again;
    Section I caught my breath
    early, head shaking
    mechanically in time.

    In Section II, I skipped
    every fifth step,
    I thought, but the time
    signatures jolted my
    staccato, flat feet.

    I got as far as Section IIIA
    when my knees collided,
    ankles together.
    At least my wrists hit
    the ground in perfect synchrony.

    Stuart Rawlinson

  • Paris In Song

    Paris In Song

    Pallavi Narayan

    Pallavi Narayan

  • Sylvia and the Lorelei

    Sylvia and the Lorelei

    Kevin Densley

    Sylvia walks a narrow path
    through a forest of tall trees,
    drawn by voices calling her
    from the fathomless depths
    of the freezing river,
    the voices of maidens
    with long, flowing,
    marble-heavy hair.
    Pinned to the sky
    is a Gothic moon,
    which Sylvia barely notices
    as, entranced by the voices,
    she advances;
    a voluptuous virgin chorus
    is calling her,
    calling her,
    calling to her
    as they rise through the twilit deep.
    She’s a slave to their siren song
    as they sing
    that this is a night to drown in.

    Kevin Densley

  • Kourtina

    Kourtina

    Zebib K. A.

    Their stage is wrapped in a shadowy cape,
    red velvet.
    It’s electrified with anticipation;
    it quivers, twist and turns,
    sweeps apart towards the sky.

    There are moments when the gods’ cloth parts,
    when the scene of all scenes
    bursts out in a blow.
    Blow song,
    toot pipes.

    The melody leaps and
    tugs at the retreat.
    A sound which holds all mystery,
    chants, arias, crescendos, and decrescendos.
    The audience perks up their ears
    and leans in.

    The child’s heart is spun.
    What haven is this sound
    for the last vestiges of magic?
    The ear tricks us,
    the rising lights trick us.

    On a screen, the long-dead actors play their part.
    Colorize!
    Play our own music!
    Behind their wide eyes and open mouths.

    Zebib K. A.

  • What’s Left in the Cooler

    What’s Left in the Cooler

    Richard LeDue

    The radio plays over the speakers
    sometimes at the local supermarket.
    Music narrating our frozen green beans,
    canned tuna, 100% whole wheat bread,
    as if a song can make us forget
    too many crave nutrients, more than love.
    The way some of us clog up the aisle
    reminds me of a hunger,
    but not for a lover’s lips;
    that is left to movie stars,
    who probably pay someone else
    to buy their groceries.
    Then there’s the poets, who make
    their lists into poems about what’s left
    in the cooler next to the ice cream
    and how there was already silence
    long before anyone turned off the radio.

    Richard LeDue

  • The Magic

    The Magic

    Parth Shirke

    Parth Shirke

  • Intervals

    Intervals

    Sasha Ockenden

    Five rows back, I’m close enough to see the sweat glisten on the first violin’s forehead, and the glimmer of light from the mezzo-soprano’s black diamante dress. The music draws me up from my seat and forwards over the four sparse rows in front of me. Towards the white-haired conductor, and away from my notes to self and the constant vibrato in both my hands and the black oblong case sitting empty in the corner of my apartment. My mind begins to drift over the stage, between the intervals of the melody.

    Fifths are earthy, grounded, cycling through channels and strings with the flick of a full hand-

    -but fourths are fresh, fresh like a newly-opened piano lid, metallic hopscotch leaps which are desperate to resolve, building a tension each time they rise that makes my neck and right foot jerk and tap with each upbeat and downbeat.

    And I’m back there, in amongst the orchestra with my desk light and pencil, surrounded by the blaring reds of the brass, the succulent blue woodwinds, the greens of the strings: grass-green for violins and violas, olive for cellos and double basses.

    Thirds, though, don’t have a colour. They’ve made their minds up: black or white, ebony or ivory, major or minor.

    I can smell my old pot of resin, feel the slight tension rising just before one of each pair has to reach out and turn the page, taste the chords behind and beside and in front of me.

    Seconds are what wrong notes feel like: squashed too close for comfort, pricking the pads of your fingers, the spanners in the wheels of the revolving fourths and fifths, trapped, hammered, broken, until-

    Unison. The final chord. Applause all around the concert hall. I smile. The musicians stand up and bow. As one, they turn to their desk partners and shake hands. Mine are still shaking, too. I turn to my right, and then to my left, but the seats either side of me are empty.

    Sasha Ockenden

  • You Make Me Bloom

    You Make Me Bloom

    Erich von Hungen

    As you pass, my branches reach.
    I throw apples round your feet.

    You make me bloom
    and sweeten into them —
    into them and more.
    Stop, stop and eat.

    I see you,
    and I scatter oranges out of season,
    scented swags every day.

    My fingers turn to figs,
    when you approach softly singing —
    to berries,
    to pomegranates.

    For you,
    I am a garden.
    Stop and pick.
    Stay.
    Take my shade, at least that.

    Cut your name across my skin.
    Climb my branches.
    Feel the wind.
    Hear it rhythm with my twigs.

    Let me feed you.
    Stay, stay, remain
    within the canopy
    of my arms, my shoulders
    and make me flourish, flower, bloom.
    Make me blossom
    more and more.

    Erich von Hungen

  • Unlocked

    Unlocked

    December Lace

    My ink was supposed to be a secret, an ode to a character in a storybook, a solemn reminder to myself that I could escape if I should ever choose to. I was locked from the inside of my own mind and I always possessed a key. Instead, smooth hands unearthed it, offered to make a twin, an escape from the locked doors and pitfalls. 

    Small droplets of ink are tucked behind my ear, tattooed, a nod to Alice and her glass tabletop key, the key that lead her out of the room of too-tall sweets and too-small drinks. Drink me, I thought to myself too often and my love would palm the ink. Drink me. 

    I wanted him to pour through me like the cherry tart/custard/pineapple/roast turkey/toffee/hot buttered, toast-flavored liquid—to wrap around my tongue and shoot straight to my stomach, flooding my insides like the Pool of Tears and carry me away on a happy tide to a calm shore. 

    The steam-filled nights of new love we shared were like a caterpillar puffing smoke from his own supply of substances. Now that the holidays and their vibrant lights and mad parties were gone, we finally made it outdoors and into the chill of the city air. 

    He’d cup the colored area behind my ear in the frigid Chicago days, transfixed in wonder, tuck my hair behind my knitted headband and get a good look at the little key stuck on to my head. 

    His eyes were the deep green of a hedge maze when he looked at me, little golden flecks the color of crowns appearing when the sunshine hit.

    “I don’t know what the meaning is behind this,” he said, “or how personal or profound, but if you don’t mind, I want to get a matching keyhole tattoo on my hand.” He showed me the padded, fleshy part of his right hand where his thumb connects to his palm. “That way, when I hold you, we’ll be even more connected.”

    And there, my heart soared. The sub-zero winds of the city smacking my face couldn’t reach my heart and no matter the wind-chill, the blood circulating in my veins was jubilant, and a tingling sensation coursed all throughout my limbs.

    I was skeptical this was all a reflection in a looking glass or just a dream, but his hand was still cupping my head behind my earlobe, staring at me like I was his favorite book and I could feel a smile spreading. 

    I must’ve looked like the Cheshire Cat before his mouth was on mine on the bright winter day with a devastating frost that no flower could survive, but I felt the warmest I had felt. It was as though a magic tonic had been drunk—my limbs had grown and I was taller than I ever thought I could be. My heart was bigger than my skin would ever allow and my body burst from a cottage, time either having no place or operating under warped rules. 

    I asked him if he was worried about pain in such a delicate spot, a minuscule ax slicing through skin and he just smirked and said no. 

    He said that if the ink ever lost the darkness of a rabbit hole, he’d get it touched up, even if it were a regular basis because of the location, being so frequently exposed to sunshine and the elements. 

    Then me, being proper as a pinafore, asked if he minded where the ink would be, so bold, so near the palm of his hand, so exposed to where people of all places could see it as he shook hands, shuffled cards, or sipped a steaming beverage. He replied that he was proud to have such a display and would happily entertain all curious inquiries as to what it was if asked, and who the headbanded girl was who owned the key that turned the lock. 

    While my key would always let me out, there was a mirror mate to take falls with me no matter how long or mysterious they might be. The awaiting door was and would always be right beside me, nearer than I had ever imagined and always unlocked. 

    I could fall forever with him beside me.

    December Lace

  • Affection

    Affection

    Karin Hedetniemi

    Karin Hedetniemi