THE CLARINET
I listened to Artie Shaw and Benny Goodman.
I liked the keys’ silver superstructure,
and the ebony stick with its subtle bell,
and its tones – mellow, lustrous, shrill, caressing.
So, to and from school, I chose to pass
a second-hand shop with a clarinet
on display in its eclectic window.
I saved for a year. ‘No,’ said the man. Next day
it was gone from the display forever.
My daughter took up the instrument
unprompted. Her daughter has followed.
I like to think that an ancestor of ours
was clarinettist in a klezmer band
with a cymbalist and a violinist,
in Bialystok, Lvov, or Kishinev,
walking and playing from shetl to shetl,
marking life’s circle of weddings
and funerals with that joyous music –
before the world was set on fire.
Ashen Venema
August 28, 2020This chimes.
Seems our desires, and those of our ancestors, desires that seek further realisation, are not easily distracted by missed moments in time.
I remember the disappointment of obstructed desires, like your hope for the clarinet.
Lovely that the joyous music has returned to your family.
John Huddart
September 1, 2020Marvellous. There was a story that circulated that you were a phenomenal keyboard player, when you were sufficiently inspired by the occasion. I’m sure it was the much missed Ron Durdey who told me this, though I was never privileged to see myself. Perhaps there is a poem in the musical seizures that are inspired by grape or grain.