MUSICAL CHAIRS

As a child we played

Musical Chairs.

Round and round the chairs

We went knowing

There was one too few

For all of us.

It was a game of chance

And mostly luck

So we giggled and we laughed

While no one always won

And the first one out

Was not always the same.

Round and round with music

Till the sudden silence

When the mad scramble began

To find an empty seat waiting

There just for you.

Yet someone lost every time

And one more chair was removed

Before the music started

Then once again we all chased

Each other round and round.

We grew older and the game

Remained, though the music changed

And the seats vanishing are

Our homes in a night,

Scholarships, and jobs,

Food and clothing

While the music plays on

Spinning webs of tension,

Filling the air with a pungency,

The flavor of anxiety so thick

It can be tasted.

Round and round we dance

To the music’s rhythm

Of off-and-on again

While we wish for bat ears

That we might catch the moment

Just before the music will stop:

We search the skies

Peer into the lightness

And the dark listening

With all our might

To hear that one sound,

Movement, change,

Signal, that will come before

The silence and the choice.