Poem To Mike Jani, Lead Forester of HRC, from Antonio Vivaldi, by Ellen Taylor
Signor Jani, carissimo, a little note.
It is I, Antonio Vivaldi, beloved of Foresters
Of the divine woodwinds, child of sad, sinking Venice
Reaching to you from the bright side of the grave.
Let me whisper to you a message from the dead
Though I am not a Yurok, not a Wailaki
but an Italian Catholic
Yea, a priest, and my grave not here, but in Vienna,
Once celebrated for its now-vanished woods.
Signor Jani, you know the secret of my music.
It is made from trees. From the great trunks
Comes the deep laughter of my bassoons.
Riparian willows weave for my flutes;
My ritornelli composed by owls
while the oboes
Rise, ancient and fernlike, from the dark
clear places under roots.
As to the strings, pure shafts of light
dropped from the sky
And many an afternoon, with my dear orphans from the Ospedale
On Brushy Ridge, on Rainbow, or the pools of the Mattole
We gather to collect them.
As the leaves make air, we make music
For our asphyxiating species
And it rises, and wafts around the world
In a joyous golden zone, shield for our souls.
Signore, my chords have roots,
My notes have stems.
Stop this stumping of my staves!
Raise your baton, high
In the rainbow of a fermata
Over our forests, and I will make you a concerto
Braided from the silver spirits of the North Forks
And we will play it for you in Heaven.
