Symphony

                                  For Mother

           Virginia Lily Raymond Hallock, 1921 - 2001

    There was a song in her heart

    That the world could not hear—

    Music no mortal could play…

The horizon awakens to blossom with dawn.

Colors unfurl in breathless backlit hues,

Setting asail silent symphonies that

Play in the heart what the ear cannot hear.

Sun rays deliver crescendo

Piercing the sky in trumpet fanfare

Scattering notes across golden fields

Draping awesome chords on meadows green.

Winds that dance in the delight of mid-day bright

Form lyrical waves of French-horn splendor.

Solar flares pierce willows like shards of crystal

That frolic with eighth-notes fallen from playful flutes.

Clarinets, and strings delightfully crisp,

Weave melodies through cumulous mist.

Thunderous tympanis embolden the score

Until piccolo rainbows rein it all in.

At last the sunset plays, on cellos mellow,

Brilliance subdued in long, gentle notes…

Till the last is played, the colors packed up

And sent on ahead to the next horizon.

There was a song in her heart that the world could not hear,

Music no mortal could play, a song no angels could sing.

And it played through her like a symphony through prisms,

Leaving us awed by a work so profoundly performed.

(Italicized lines adapted from a gospel song)