Aiden Heung
Flute
The notes come like a wash
of falling pearls but better arranged,
patterned like a river or a sea
or any bewitched moments
of a wintry night. My skin feels it,
electric like a touch, like water turning
instantaneously ice
and cold is the nocturne he plays
under an overpass as he leans deeper
into the light that flocks the air
with lacy brown. But the music
is a jellyfish moon rattling the ocean.
I’m suddenly nostalgic,
before me a wave of yesterdays
I never knew how to respond to.
I’m a hand reaching into the dark,
a voice asking where and who.
I’m again the boy who sat alone
day after day under a star-studded sky.
But I’ve forgotten what ached.
He stops playing,
packs his flute in a leather case.
I keep my window open.
About the writer:
Aiden Heung is a Chinese poet born and raised on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau. He writes about his personal past in a Tibetan Autonomous Town and the city of Shanghai where he currently lives. Other themes include ancestry, nature-human relations, queer culture, the dehumanizing force of the city, politics, and his imaginary wonderland. Heung’s words have appeared or are forthcoming in Australian Poetry Journal, Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, Poet Lore, Hobart, Parentheses, Barren Magazine, Voice & Verse Poetry Magazine, Potomac Review, among other places. Heung is a reader of world literature.
Image: Strange Light on the Horizon by Bruno Kurz (1957-). No medium specified. No size specified. 2015. By free license.
I love the sound of the flute’s notes being compared to “a wash of falling pearls” but arranged better
Or “patterned like a river or a sea” we can see light and movement synaesthetically.
Then the comparison moves to magical moments, but specifically “of a wintry night”.
This music affects the poet viscerally and sensually and we can only imagine how exquisite it sounds. It is fluid, mellow and lit like the Moon.
Now the mood shifts to the poets memories which are triggered by the melody.
Nostalgia and mystery are aroused as he reaches out to his lonely past self, lost under the vastness of the Milky Way. Perhaps a younger self unsure of his place in the world.
Then abruptly his journey is over, the flautist leaves
But still haunted he leaves his window open to the possibility of a return tomorrow
Music often transports us to places, times and imaginings. It is more pure than words, more evocative than even this beautifully crafted poem
Thank you