BIRD SONG
I envy Olivier Messiaen
stalking early mornings in the
fields of
France, in a
magazine article I saw
years ago, with a
notebook, notating
bird
song!
He is said to be able to orchestrate birdcalls
just by hearing them, write those
trills and
watery runs with
tiny black dots on lines a musician back in a
musty room might play on his clarinet!
Notes, out of
tree-wilderness, out of
bird language, one to
another
for
whatever reason, bodily
companionship, territorial
rights, mating calls, thrills of
pleasure in the plumage,
beak
gabble, sunlight
delirium, a bird's sense of
entertainment, some
floating
on updrafts,
whatever reasons God gives them for responding the
way God's made them
respond over
a
silken wheat field at
first slants of
dawn,
gold
light along
dew blankets,
the world waking
up, birds
registering the
waking,
Messiaen with his
stubby pencil attached like a
seismograph to the knowledge of his
ear making
dots with or without little
black flags attached someone
back in a room can play on his
clarinet, or a
whole
orchestra, celestas, flutes, hitting those
high note-clusters, enraptured –
for
no reason!
3/30
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