The Street Organ - And Also the Trees

The street organ plays

Its blithe tune through the town,

Winding down the alleys with the yellow

Leaves

It meanders down bleak avenues where

The copper-green monuments stare

At nothing…

It passes them by unheard

Waltzes with the ribbons of distant winter air

The messengers of snow…

Moon-struck and gold

It croons with the lullbabys that full

The babies back to wombs

Confuses time with its merry sombre chiming

Calling back the old

Conjures daughters, lovers, sons

Fears, mothers, seasons, minutes

Lost and found, lost love, spring and nothing

She sings like a bird that wakes up warm

And thinks the winter’s over

The street organ’s music is heard

For the first time here and the last time

There

And not at all

Cathedral quiet and narcotic seas

In a mind of tide-mark memories…

The strand of hair that falls in front of her face…

He woke up and called out her name

But only the street organ answered

The street organ plays down every road

Moon-struck and gold