This week's 'Music Show', with Andrew Ford, on ABC's Radio National, opened with Hugh Crosthwaite's 'Counterpoise', a haunting work for solo violin.
The piece is played by Sarah Curro, who is interviewed, along with her husband Paul Davies, a luthier, about the different qualities of violins. It's a fascinating interview.
Hugh's piece was inspired by my poem, also called 'Counterpoise', published in my first book of poems, Angels, like laundry.
Counterpoise
Behind, beside, before;
once, nonce, hence –
time pools in the present
tense; deeps of now brim–
never to be reclaimed,
ever flowing silently away.
Mulch, mushroom, messmate;
foundation, footings, framework –
building begets spaces,
earth cleaves to sky;
light brings forth shadow,
action yields to rest –
stone, plank, tile,
myrtle, moss, manure.
Pulse, breath, blink;
bone, flesh, hide –
inner engenders outer,
launches soaring dreams;
summer’s gold garnered for
fecund swelling fall –
pith, pulp, peel;
never, nigh, next -
New grows old, old
gives way to new.
On time’s curving arc, end-
ing is beginning –
former, forthwith, final:
past, present, prospect,
was, is, ever.
