Composers

As everything nice has been written
by Grieg and Liszt and Benjamin Britten,
by Mozart and Bartok and the venerable Brahms
nothing remains but to write solos for drums.

Worst the contemporary ones
who live for weeks like monks and nuns
just to come up with a rhythm fantasy
that turns out to be musical hypocrisy.

They don't understand what it means to compose,
and quickly end up in the public's sheer overdose.
Visible as the only effect that lasts for me
it's the cracks in the walls of the philharmonie.

Music or torture, that's the question,
not like Hamlet's odd confession,
to perform or not to perform,
with emotions and pleasure completely forlorn.

How magic it was 200 years ago,
when Kings listened to the throbbing piano,
when nobles danced the Quadrille
and bad composers lost their place to be.

F Sz 10 Oct 2006 Chevry