- for Martha and her father -
In my long search for the key with which to open
the very Book of Life on which all rests,
I chanced on your father, who also was groping
upon a veritable hill of treasure chests.
It was he who taught me to set measures,
in a supple rubato neither taut nor slack,
as much for the body’s health as for its pleasures –
the Tempo of Being: alert yet relaxed.
I miss your dad – I’ve moved to an adjacent hill.
Someday, like us, you’ll go searching wood, valley, stream.
I can’t tell you how, but find it you will,
no doubt by some small detail, some crease in the seam.
For the book is untitled, unruled and unlined.
Take a look inside and you’ll surely find
the name that once came to your father in a dream.
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