Megan Hyska
The Saxophone Player
Adorning an introspective air with syncopated flair
Coming from the room around the corner
Up the stair
It’s beautiful, but I won’t go there
To see the saxophone player
Greeting the morning with a melody laid bare:
No bass or drum
Does deem to thrum
In the back ground
No one to compromise the sound
No one to make the noise blend in
As just another aspect of some distant din
No, it is alone, he is alone
A stylite preaching from atop his elevated throne
Entrenched in conviction, without fear
And so I can not help but hear:
Swing, ring, twirl
Twist and sway
And at its zenith
The suddenly calcified
Long, low, forte
The Saxophone player greets the morning
He has good company in that wailing tone
But I, embodying no Orpheus, nor archetype
I’m all alone
Anticipating slipping, sliding rhythms
Waiting for notes unknown
The extrovert for once is caught
In solitary reveries
His glinting, shining birdsong is not
For anyone but him, no, not for me
But I wonder
Years from now playing in clubs dense with people and with smoke
Will he remember the days when he would play
Before most people even awoke?
When he and his saxophone both were young
And both the day and all time had just begun
And the sun came up more glorious at the bidding of the song that he invoked
Or, will it be that whenever he begins to play
His giggling, chattering muse
Now and then will be utterly confused
Until they are condensed in one moment, they are both the same
Though in one, I stand downstairs listening
And in the other I’ll be unaware and far away
The saxophone player greets the morning
Clacking keys in fluorescent light
I walk away unnoticed
From the range of his song, from the range of my sight
To leave his rising sonic sun
As it ushers out my soundless night© Copyright 2006 by Megan Hyska
Megan Hyska is a young writer currently residing in Port Moody, British Columbia. She attends the "Connections" writing group put on by Pandora's Collective and recently performed at the Vancouver Poetry Slam. In her spare time she can be found playing the flute and guitar.