image courtesy of Ted Bossis
www.tedbossis.com

excerpt from Beyond Understanding

Today I imagined
the heavenly firmament
as a cache of infinite musical notes.
Suspended in a kind of random fashion,
I was given an idea to view the heavens
through a large transparency etched
with the lines of a musical staff

Holding the sheet up against the sky,
I was perfectly beguiled when the stars
became notes stacked in harmonies
of minor fifths and sevenths

Majestic chords appeared
before me,
and a wash of minuet and
motet mysteriously blossomed
in a supernal opus flowing forward

I could see,
aggrandized with tercets and triads,
grand compositions gracing the
musical staff in random fashion

Was it possible that a glorious
enlightenment of astrophysical symphonies
were suspended in space that,
when interpreted,
could unlock mysteries,
and open distant portals to
places never before seen or heard?

Was this the music of the third heaven?

Was it possible
that healing balms could be
produced from these inventions
that were capable of soothing broken hearts,
and changing the ego-centric panoramas of arrogant humanity?

Entranced now in sheer loftiness,
and with a (temporary) gift of heightened auditory acuity,
I moved the transparency
across the sky
and listened,
enthralled,
as Centaurus
became a cantus firmus,
and Leo Minor a seraphic capriccio.
Moving to the north, the Corona Borealis
played out as a madrigal of the sweetest simplicity,
while Leo Major roared in perpetuum mobile.
Moving collectively together, in contrapuntal base,
the Gemini Twins danced in an exoticism of far off lands,
while Cassiopeia became an oratorio of genteel luster.
With the grandeur of a Turkish Sultan,
Pegasus celebrated with
a lively blending of
double-reed instruments,
triangles,
bass drums,
cymbals,
bell-trees
and trumpets.
In bel canto
Andromeda sang in purity,
whilst Picis Austrinus became
a chaste passacaglia

And with
every movement
of the transparency
another motif of
harmonic brilliance
spilled forth in this
profoundly majestic mingling
of glimmering stars and celestial bodies

For a mortal
this was truly a gift
beyond understanding,
this wealth of possibilities invited all seekers
(brave enough to look up and touch the hem of it)
a chance to dream and create