Because of course I did

AN IDEA OF IMPROVISATION AS ADAGIO FOR VIOLIN AND VIOLA
(for Hilary Hahn)

Not unlike the way 

twin fingers might crave 

sliding down a neck—

to bend a pitch—

until a layer

of uncertainty

begins to merge

two citrus bodies—

say a blood or

navel orange—

in a still life.

And yet not a ‘sound’ 

as in a long passage

connecting two bodies 

of water below 

a duvet of darkness

or as waves 

of intonation from

red carnation lips

making the leaps 

of a ghazal

into the sea

of a secret which

—when you toss 

your hair that way—

seems to ripple like

what in a lower light

could be called

—for now—

abandon.

But a sound

of fingers

on taut strings—

while orange petals

warm the air 

above the wisp

of a wick—

as if any two

wooden bodies

might share a note

—or anything 

hand drawn—

to inscribe us close 

to a Trouble Clef

where a silkening seems

to blend us into 

one long scarf of sigh

—almost pianissimo 

as freshly cut violets—

or perhaps reaches

beneath a bare

strip of thigh

that begins to ripple

with the blood 

or navel orange’s

silent ache—

as if only until dawn,

as if only until 

the filaments

feel prone to rise or fall 

as a brush of red incarnate

on a stretch of open neck.