January 2023
Bio Note: With piles of repertoire to learn for playing viola in the Madison Symphony and Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, my cats lately scatter when I tune up. I am delighted that my full-length collection The Waiting Room for the Imperfect Alibis is out from Kelsay Books and The Devil Orders a Latte is forthcoming from Fernwood Press and I have two Pushcart Prize nominations and quite a few chickens.
Pathetique
The moment
in the second movement
when the orchestra
has become a single animal,
breathing in 5/4,
the timpani’s heartbeat
pushing us through
each phrase,
a timing,
a smoldering
and we swirl through
a three-legged
waltz of love,
towards the inevitable
disenchantment
in the next movement,
in the next moment
Almost
He must have been rushing out
for a last cigarette
but St. John the Baptist
just about collided with me
as I entered the stage door
Imagine, violist flattened by
a good-looking prophet in burlap
who will reject Salome in
forty-three minutes
A small man in black with a headset
was chasing him with
his found cell phone
and, for the moment,
all was well for
the future saint
and beheading was still
an unknown destiny
for some other stage
Entrance
During the lesson,
on the page before
Song of the Wind,
the front door blew open
blew open in
the fairytale way,
announcing the arrival
arriving the announcement
Fall had fallen with a
crash into our lives
Like a Beethoven chord
Like an
unexpected
love
©2023 Katrin Talbot
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