Organ Music (Elegy 2)

The known world:

mother, thigh.

Overhead

the mystery of other

heads, strange

language of other voices.

Laughter. Shrieks.

Carnival is the organ music

that spins with

the green and white

wheels of light;

with the paper lanterns

in subtle swing on the strings

dangled between the yellow and blue

tented booths,

where the music smells of

roasted almonds, popcorn,

and hums

with the hiss of friers

and the fitful clack

of rings and buzzers,

mallets and bells;

past the games

and beyond the faces,

through this perimeter

the music

joins the swirling heart

of laughter and shrieks—

Child sees

there is another world

given

between the bodies,

opened

in the changing

direction of the laughter

and the shrieks.

Sees it is through the music

the light

spins and swings

the wheels and lanterns.

Sees a music

given to itself.

In this,

child has lost

mother, thigh,

but, given as breath,

must bear out

the absence:

to grasp at air

in which hover

the other heads,

the other voices,

thrust into

the other world

past the perimeter of bodies.

Child learns

to be lost, is—

the carousel of horses

with golden rods

through their hearts,

condemned to

the instant of terror.

If only there were saddles

for their savaged eyes,

if only there were bridles

for their mouths, pried

open in delirious

laughter and shrieks

that issue

in the quavering pitch

and unalterable

loudness

from the steaming calliopes

of their hearts.