A Noted Recital

(for Michel Belair)

When the notes are changing by the second
like your nerves in a continuum,
it can turn around the decadent
and tired. Sound-waves rearrange the room,

the classical is rehabilitation,
rapid pulses from an instrument.
When I heard him on a radio station
it was less intensive, the intent

is constant, of rehearsing the delicious.
Repetition gives you confidence,
when you focus it is efficacious.
The ineffable is on the fence,

you need a calibrated instrument
to get it off. An acoustic wood,
a sonatina played in increments
and I would reproduce it if I could.

His fingers touching on the strings and frets
like a spider on a web, the research
of a distillation one forgets.
The recital occurring in a church,

a guitar providing the forgiveness
of our sins? A reverential timing,
and a higher level more or less
of consciousness. The musical is climbing

on the wooden trellis of a high-strung
instrument, it's like a kind of prayer
although it's secular, we're not unsung
with a song dissolving in mid-air.