Learning Mozart All Over Again Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

of course her shoes would be patent leather red!
how could we question that? (the girl who danced
on the record unable to stop when the music did)

since you had flats of cherry velvet

and danced on the messy side of the room
singing 'nimbus, nimbus, cumulo stratus'
on the Saturday afternoons we discovered that

cloud names made us laugh the most of all
when repeated over and over.
today I prayed you would fear no funnels

fast appearing in the emerald or the Fair skies
whisking you away. and that no one would serve
you funnel cakes with trick pink candles.

today I prayed without disguise
someone would remember your birthday
and scatter small rosebuds as if you

were in an old play
in ballet skirts of pale red and blue equals
violet of the loveliest hue.

and you are far away
in your own music wrapped,
as you were then;

learning Mozart all over again.

mary angela douglas 12 august 2015