Someone Has Spread A Carpet Of Roses

[on Cliburn playing, Widmung (Schumann-Liszt)]

someone has spread a carpet of roses

as light comes and then goes and comes again

and a face is dappled, and you know

someone was here in the music before you

but where?

you wander through castles endlessly,

through clouds, through subterfuge and

who is listening? is it only you and blindingly

alive in endless variations: glistening, a

crystal of unshed tears in a palm extended

or are you

held aloft by those with wings and still

in the stillness all your own

alone except in dreams where someone has

spread for you a carpet of roses and feeling

flows as in music and seemingly crescendos and

then it flows away I hear you say, diminuendo...

who is playing? who has left this shimmer of

something in the air more fragile than a sigh

oh who, who is it there, still nigh:

after the sound of roses dies

mary angela douglas 10 august 2014