Night Song

Merle Oberon is a vessel of light.
She has the brains to go with the diamonds.

She gives up a jillion dollars and a pretty boyfriend
for the love of music.

When we find what we can’t have,
the whole body hurts, the tongue hurts,

the skull like a teapot.
It starts in the eyes.

If you want to ask something, ask it.
If you want to do something, do it.

Live like that.
My vistas are framed by pine boughs.

Waves on the lake tick like a clock.
I know what I’m entitled to have.

When I am blind, you are blind.
We are two blind people in a city full of eyes.

You take me for walks on the beach.
Stand in smoke and light in front of Carnegie Hall.

The boiled wool of the Great Plains trundles past
our too-big windows on the train.

Light me a torch, will you chum?
I trade boogie-woogie for beer and hamburger.

Music is all I have to live for.
My heart’s an old wastepaper basket.

Merle’s face asleep on a plane,
a child tucked into bed.

The symphony’s over. You can let your hair down
and become human again.