When I was very young, I often fantasized that there was a world where the only way to communicate was through music.
During my high school years, I had a friend who had a theory that musicians were really just singing messages back and forth to each other.
And all through my life, just in case, I have collected maps. After reading this poem I wonder, maybe it’s through our maps that we discover all that lies under them.
A Course in Creative Writing
They want a wilderness with a map –
but how about errors that give a new start? –
or leaves that are edging into the light? –
or the many places a road can’t find? –
Maybe there’s a land where you have to sing
to explain anything: you blow a little whistle
just right and the next tree you meet is itself.
(And many a tree is not there yet.)
Things come toward you when you walk.
You go along singing a song that says
where you are going becomes its own
because you start. You blow a little whistle –
And a world begins under the map.
William Stafford
Birds would understand this world of music. I love the poem. Thanks for sharing it.
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delightful!
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Love this Debra. Thank you.
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