crisis

my prayer today was full of music.
sounds good put like that but it wasn't at all.
music dammed up, or a weight round my neck -
like dragging a long chain.
sing a new song.
who is my music for?
is it for me?
it cannot be for me.
but then if noone else is listening who can it be for?

the tussle is between my prayer and my music.
my prayer is with you.
in prayer I am in you
which is where I need to be.
my music is something quite different
and while it is, there can be no music.
yet the flow and the need are there -
[today's prayer full of dammed-up music tells me this.]

the added problem is that music is an entirely 'other language'.
for me there can be no 'decorative adjectives' or 'romantic allusions'.
my music cannot come from that space.
[writing songs is impossible: like listening to two languages at once.]
it can't be a question of complexity or 'finish':
it can only be a question of 'flow' of 'travel'.
in the lightest, simplest possible way.
this is the same in prayer is it not?

is prayer in any way 'travel' or 'flow'?
perhaps that isnt for me to know . . . .
then why should it be so in music?

when it comes to my music,
the real chain around my neck has always been 'thought' itself.
music must be music and nothing more.
just as an elephant is an elephant
and God is God,
my music can only be my music.
and it can only make sense in it's own terms.
'context' or 'meaning' must emanate from its own existence
and nowhere else.

and ugliness?
clumsy phrasing?
inadequate orchestration?
all these things blur and damage:
environmental toxins perhaps.
weakening the essential thread
but not necessarily breaking it.

fragile then.
[yes: very.
but hadn't we already come to terms with that?]
a thin veil.
watercolour.
no beethovenian solidity here.
and any attempt at it (1st symphony)
sounds preposterous.

perhaps most of all it's about healing.
and perhaps for a while I should just do what I do in difficult times:
have faith:
fight against the tide of doubts and jeers and indifference.