Untuned

Untuned 

Beasts gone wild who take gardens

for pasture     — Ibn Faraj

          Rivers border this city composed

     of flatted thirds like minor voices

spread along the horizon. Can't sun

shade as well as lightening? Until our toes

sift through the desert, beasts will ferry us

to new springs where fronds seem dazed

by our tone. Unless sound disappears

     with moonrise like flowers folding

     at sunset? Between the first interval

     and the last, in a city with no balconies,

no homes with guitars, no guts for strings,

even our days lack harmony with night.

No charts for these violins with no bows.

Why hasn't our path transposed this music?

[sonnet]