<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
4\u201933\u201d <\/em>He climbed up the stairs and said \u2013 No more<\/em>. \u00a0Sinking into the sofa he wired himself to his iPod, thumbed for the track 4\u201933\u201d of silence, shut his eyes and listened. \u00a0Within a minute he pulled out the white ear buds and shifted over to the piano, determined to play the entire piece himself \u2013 all three movements.<\/p>\n Palpitations punched against unwelcome thoughts during the first 30 seconds. Toward the end of the 2\u2019 23\u201d middle movement his breathing and pulse steadied and he surfed through a lazuli tunnel. \u00a0The illusory peace parted in the last 40 seconds, when graphic images of his flame-turn-femme-fatale sucked him into Charybdis\u2019 gullet, spitting him out in gut-grime rage.<\/p>\n Foiled, he slammed the piano lid shut, jumped up and kicked the stepladder that led to the attic where he hid his past and kept his future caged. \u00a0The rickety ladder crashed onto his guitar. \u00a0With a yelp he snatched his old Epiphone and sat on the sofa to inspect \u2013 just a dent, no cracks<\/em>. \u00a0Relieved, he again set the timer of his iPod stopwatch.<\/p>\n Hugging his guitar he settled into silence, this time playing it as one instead of three movements. \u00a0Everybody needs their 4\u201933\u201d of silence, <\/em>he thought \u2013 a time to reach out into a freed space of nothing.<\/em> \u00a0Halfway through his cell phone erupted with Radiohead\u2019s \u201cCreep\u201d ringtone. \u00a0Unable to ignore the techno-nymph he put the six strings back on the stand and silenced his cell, growling at the unwanted caller \u2013 the one he\u2019d love to stick in the attic and stuff into a box, together with all the diaries, letters, photos and vinyl albums.<\/p>\n Walking over to the French window, he blew a vapor heart on the glass, and cut a cross through it with his tongue. \u00a0The cold of the pane calmed him. \u00a0Can\u2019t be that difficult<\/em>, he thought. \u00a0Let\u2019s try drumming<\/em>. \u00a0He set the timer for a third attempt, jammed his djembe between his knees and began.<\/p>\n After seven seconds Merce, his beagle, scratched against the front door, needing to pee in the garden; the squirrel with the split ear started raiding the bird feeder; and after 2\u201954\u201d he suddenly remembered the appointment he should be at. From nowhere a great line for a poem flashed up which would evaporate if he didn\u2019t write it down immediately; thick raindrops plodded on the deck, and the washing needed to be brought in.<\/p>\n Undeterred he played on, drumming in perfect silence, eyes closed, accepting the moment and its peripheral sounds, letting them go \u2013 letting it all go, releasing his remorse and freeing his fears, his need to control. \u00a0He forgave her and wrapped her up in his warm hush. \u00a0All sounds ceased. \u00a0He\u2019d made it through the 4\u201933\u201d. \u00a0Space was transformed and stillness resounded. \u00a0It needs practice \u2013 daily<\/em>. \u00a0He felt un-caged.<\/p>\n Eric G. M\u00fcller<\/strong> is a musician, teacher and writer living in upstate New York. \u00a0He has written two novels, Rites of Rock<\/em> (Adonis Press 2005) and Meet Me at the Met<\/em> (Plain View Press, 2010), as well as a collection of poetry, Coffee on the Piano for You<\/em> (Adonis Press, 2008). \u00a0Articles, short stories and poetry have appeared in many journals and magazines.www.ericgmuller.com\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 4\u201933\u201d (In honor of John Cage\u2019s centennial \u20131912 \u2013 1992) He climbed up the stairs and said \u2013 No more. \u00a0Sinking into the sofa he wired himself to his iPod, thumbed for the track 4\u201933\u201d of silence, shut his eyes and listened. \u00a0Within a minute he pulled out the white ear buds and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4192"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4193,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4192\/revisions\/4193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/strong>(In honor of John Cage\u2019s centennial \u20131912 \u2013 1992)<\/p>\n