but when he died,
we stopped;
for those who knew,
found wordless were their thoughts.

does music live,
when those who made it are gone?
or is it merely a ghost,
a fading echo of what was once living?

there was a day,
a strong-remembered afternoon,
with the smell of cooking vegetables and spices.
on that day,
we gathered for the music and the water:
where flows the living stream,
we ride the current.

now, bereft,
a fountain:
today, within,
an abandoned mainspring —

when music flowed like water,
we were alive, we were alive,

we were

 
at peace