I do not consider myself a poet. I do not think poetically with every thought. However, I do appreciate metaphors, imagery, and other forms of speech that makes up a poet's vocabulary. Occasionally I am overcome with emotional thought and lines of a poem come up for me. That's what happened with the following poem.
On December 10, I had the phrases, the "gist," and the ending. But I knew it needed to simmer and I didn't want to publish it until the anniversary of Rocky's death. It simmered until today when I opened it up in the word processor. By now, it easily assumed a poetic form, and some new words make it stronger, in my opinion.
Here it is, in honor of Reginald B. Rockwell, my beloved Rocky:
The Music Dies Away
The Hospice room has been full of Rachmaninov,
Music from that foreign land and long ago time,
Well-loved by my mate throughout his eighty years,
Always playing in the background,
As he toiled and played and loved me,
His body moving to the rhythm of a concerto
With the look of an eighteen-year old,
Our bodies touched and our damp hair mingled,
Sometimes I could tell he'd become the melody,
The notes, the staff, the harmony,
Sometimes he'd wave his fists into the air to conduct
the energy,
And the concerto became the foreground, the background,
And all of it became the All Of It,
My love's energy unites with the music now,
The CD woos his worn-out heart,
Caresses his medicated mind, calms his slowed breaths,
He slowly drifts along with the fading life's flow,
The end of the last Track is here,
The Bose turns itself off,
The power of a vibrant creator hangs in the air,
The room becomes still as the beautiful music
.....dies away
Rocky at age 18 playing his beloved music.
