THE SUPPORT FOR MUSIC Poem by Vasco Graça Moura

the support for music can be the relationship
between a man and a woman, the staff
of their hands that touch, of their
eyes that meet, of their

vowels they discover to be reciprocally open,
or of the obscure signs of understanding
that grow between them like creeping plants.
the support for music can be the appetite

of their ears and nose for all the ramifications
between timbres, between scents,
but it is also, as they know, an inner rhythm,
a part of the cosmos passing close by

for a few fragile moments, concentrated
in a minuscule, intensely luminous point
that music, breaking forth, enlarges
between familiarity and its ally, harmony.