even the opening chords were wrong
those plaintive just awakened half diminished
scales     flat in all the wrong places

the day grew only more dischordant
as if the better players in the orchestra
deserted me left only a tuba and a violin

there once had been a melody
a kind of score written on old paper
the quarter notes black the half notes hollow

but today the hours stumbled like beginning
dancers trying to keep time their minute feet
unskilled and all the music off-key

so that the approaching darkness of night
comes welcome even with the fear
of its attendant nightmares

the atonal scale descends and the chords
break into arpeggios with spaces in togetherness
there will be music once again