5000 Musical Terms

Poems

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“— In short, must a song
always be a song!”
— Charles Ives

Holding Pattern over Providence

For new things one necessarily chooses new words. Call our adepts 
spiritists, our teaching spiritism, our reading 
books of spirits. Forget the past — one cannot know everything — 
     the spirit 
loses memories to become itself. The veil 
is the return to bodily life.

Divine angels, you expected, predictably enough, these corrections 
which I implore you to make in the manuscript. Mad as a tripod, 
and difficult, I dictate nothing more, all else will derive 
from actors’ games. Play Les Scythes as if it were 
La Philosophie dans le boudoir, and Les Scythes will have an effect 
of cold, of nonsense, of fabric cut against the grain. 

We have only volume two; how can we be responsible 
for ratcheting our faults beyond the limit of the past? How can we
     profit 
from experience acquired in forgetfulness? There are gaps 
or things missed out in this account. To make up 
for something forgotten or for a lapse or oversight that cost him
     his life. 
I can’t remember whom I should warn. 

I have not forgotten the guide, kind sir who at each new level of
     existence 
surveys the mistakes committed, judges the given position as just, 
makes amends for what has leaked out along the way. He looks 
for proofs analogous to those we learned before, and asks the
     spirits 
who are his superiors for help in this new task, intuition, 
piecework I’ll do in my own good time. 

The Antediluvian World

Was such a catastrophe possible? The testimony of the sea
is unequivocally yes; catastrophes are continual, commonplace, and
     require
no great preparation or anterior warning. Geologically speaking,
we are the last of an incalculable number of vast changes,
continents sunk under the ocean while new lands rise on both sides
     of it. 
A loud explosion was heard, and immense columns of boiling mud,
mixed with lapilli, of the size of nuts, were projected from the
     mountain;
on the following days the rain fell in torrents. 

Testimony of the flora and fauna is likewise abundant and
     irrefutable.
The banana is seedless. Have you never wondered at this? The
     deluge,
when it comes, is total. The Pacific coast possesses no papaw,
no linden or basswood, no locust trees, no cherry tree large enough
     for timber,
no gum trees, no sorrel tree, nor kalmia; no persimmon trees, 
not a holly, only one ash that may be called a timber tree, no
     catalpa or
sassafras, not a single elm or hackberry, not a mulberry,
not a hickory, or a beech, or a true chestnut.

Our deluge is not the first; our actual race of man
is not the first. “The earth,” says Cosmos, “presses downward,
but the igneous parts tend upward.” The sun hangs suspended in
     between,
hidden behind a crooked mountain at night.

Isinglass

It has often, through the course of life, been my lot
to meet with such friends, and I have built upon their love,
and felt secure in their friendship, who when adversity came,
then would the scene of my boyhood return
upon my imagination, and the thought force itself upon me,
that I had again, while searching for crystal, found
and been struggling only for isinglass.

What is the rule? What kind of stone is crystal?

At length, by the help of tufts of grass which grew here and there
at the jetting of rocks, I, with great exertions, reached
the top, and, creeping carefully to the edge of the precipice,
seized the prize. But what was my disappointment, when I found
that I had climbed the steep, and risked my life, to attain
a piece of isinglass!

Rule: learn to read and talk so correctly as to have
no occasion to repeat or change your words. Think how
a sentence would look, if written or printed as a careless person
reads it; or how a person would appear in walking, if he moved
so halting, and backward and forward, as many do in reading.

I now commenced my search in earnest, but still, as before,
fortune seemed, in an uncommon manner, to avoid me. There is but
an hour or so left, said I, throwing my eyes upward to the sun;
even now, the bottom of the quarry begins to grow dusky,
and, if not soon successful, I shall have to give up the search,
and make the best of my way to the city. I was again commencing
my exertions, when my eye rested on the highest point of a rocky
     hill,
which, by the continued labors of the quarrymen, approached
nearly to the form of a cone. There, on the summit, and at the very
     edge
of one of its steepest sides, lay something sparkling in the sun.
     Ha!
thought I, there is something to reward an afternoon’s labor; it
     must,
by its brilliancy, be a noble piece of crystal.

What is the rule? Will the reader look at his hearers as 
much as he can, and yet read correctly? Is it not also necessary, 
and more than good manners, that those to whom the reading is
     addressed, 
should look at the reader, and attend well to what he says?

I always console myself with the idea, that I have, at least, 
gained some knowledge of those that surround me; but though 
I always return with an increase of experience, it is mingled 
with disappointment. Natural history has been called
the science of observation; and as an observer, every man 
has it in his power to become a naturalist in a greater or lesser
     degree. 
Every detached object of this science — every crystal, or stone — 
not only excites interest, when we have acquired, by careful
     investigation,
a knowledge of its properties, but leads the mind forward 
to new subjects of curiosity. Isinglass: its principal use 
is for clarifying wines and other liquids. It generally appears
as leaf, book, and long and short staple; or pipe, lump, and
     honeycomb.
It has valuable agglutinating properties; dissolving in two parts
     alcohol
it forms a diamond cement, the solution cooling to a white, opaque,
hard solid. To increase its availability, the raw material is
     sorted,
soaked in water till it becomes flexible and then trimmed; the
     sheets
are passed between steel rollers, which reduce them to the
     thickness
of paper; it then appears as a transparent ribbon, shot like
     watered silk. 
The ribbon is dried, and, if necessary, cut into strips. The
     material 
is obtained from the swimming bladder or “sound” of fish, the most
     valuable 
being species of sturgeon: the seuruga (Acipenser stellatus), 
the sterlet (Acipenser ruthenus), the ossétr (Acipenser
     güldenstädtii).

Winter Night

The subject is a scene on Central Park West and 73rd Street.
My notions at the time were those of a “purist,” which accounts
for the dreamy mood as well as the stark character of the work.
The idea about subject matter is that it should help to typify,
uniquely. The Blue Inn: neither an inn nor is it blue. Figures
are incidentals. The weird procession of flagellants chanting 
mournfully in the night may be seldom seen, less so by visitors,
but does it translate to an idea? No apologies. The night
really posed for the painting. And we look up
at this blue barrier as if it were some fragment of a wall
which anciently bounded the earth in that direction.

The Intellectual Life

One word presents itself before others: simplify. You have
a difficult voyage; you must lie down; is there a law
to govern the necessary estrangement, pushing through the crowd,
cutting of teeth — is there a road away from the village,
and toward the problem at hand? One can always reveal the soul;
fingers draw the curtain apart; a card game is in progress;
but one mustn’t hitch dissimilar animals, one needn’t solve
the wrong problems. The game, though visible, is nonetheless
an argument for solitude. Cooperate with your peers; cultivate
necessary relations; yet conserve your fair share of necessary
     action.
Maintain above all an interior silence. Reduce your rate 
of expenditure. Conserve the flux of thought, chattering mind.

“It is not necessary to believe,” writes Mme. de B. in her journal,
“that the best and sole use of time is calm, sustained, and
     ordered.
Agitation is a useful state of mind; corresponding as it does 
to our actual state of being. One mustn’t think that work is more 
than a supplement of possibilities to the achievement of one’s
     being.”

De la Lecture

Tell me why you like A, B, C . . . 
Perception? I am afraid of the category
“no,” even in the case of a response.
To take a biological example: let the student
make a description of a tree. Of a tree
that cannot be confounded with any other.
Of the type of tree without reference
to any other tree. Now count the words
that obscure the tree. Break the ambition
of those discrete individuals who might wish
to be confused. And if some lover such as we
have heard this dialogue of one, believe
that the reader will see it. The tree.
Ideal republic: A, B, or C . . . 

Failures

A failure broke the monotonous uniformity — a few exercises, 
short easy sentences, and we begin anew: open the door,
admit we’re done. They mean to expel him from the school.
I regret to hear it.

A tree has roots, a trunk, and stems, and each branch or bough
has twigs; and these bear leaves, and some have fruit, as pears
and plums, and figs.

What is perfection? Deprived of all but innocence, the elephant
took the child up with his trunk, and placed it on his back,
and never afterward obeyed another master. Other models follow, 
examples for practice. Sentences lengthen, always of course
the unassisted production of the pupil himself, so what use these 
suggestions, dictations?

I fix my eyes on different objects, and soon perceive I have the
     power
of losing and recovering them; and that I can at pleasure destroy
and renew this beautiful part of my existence.

Long Weekend

Consulting an international code of hydrography, we find:
“There is an uncharted obstruction in the channel. You should
     proceed
with caution.” But the pyramidal obstruction is in fact man-made,
painted white with the enthusiastic idealism of one who builds
bricks on rocks to make the rocks more visible.
Pure shapes are, let us suppose, more practical; resistant to the
     elements
and also the pure white resembles salt, or surf; in theory
there are reasons for every decision, but not so here
where so many obstructions exist one cannot possibly chart them
     all.
Tell me how to pass — how to weave — you are clear of danger — 
are you clear of all danger? — The undulating niddy-noddy
and rotating umbrella swift are in classically experienced hands
or old hands at least, these problems in the channel having been
     drawn
out of the chart chest in the hall; where beside the octant
and creased slightly by the brass speaking trumpet
we find the aforementioned code, a document of practical
contradictions: You should proceed with great caution — 
you should proceed without assistance — there is not sufficient
depth of water — there is sufficient depth of water — I have no
radar — are you equipped with radar?

Nota Bene

Simple suggestions, when directed at one’s self, can render 
powerful effects; viz., the amateur violinist, told he is
     professional,
plays (while asleep) to suit. At a certain time, always the same
     one, 
I wake up and prepare a breakfast of boiled eggs and tea. On the
     fifth 
day of the month, which I always keep holy, in order to pass the
     rest 
of the day in meditation and prayer, I ascended the high hills of 
     B — . 
Landscapes consisting of parts and members, or even very simple and 
uniform ones, can be variously arranged, their sense remains
     unaltered. 
Drowning hills leaves islands, contours unchanged though now 
only visible theoretically. Instruments play louder and louder
to reach places that used to resound with whispers. But that’s 
     re-use, 
something let’s assume one must champion over destruction. 
What was here is carted away in pieces, what they bring is enough 
to continue a tradition of what’s left. Which is continuity.
     Failure to continue
is, well, the schoolbook says: John was buried here. This single
     sentence 
may be read twenty-four different ways, four of which will be
     questions. 
1) The farmer, Pete, ardently loves the beautiful shepherdess,
     Mary. 
I ascended the high hills of B — , in order to pass the rest of the
     day 
in meditation and prayer, on the fifth day of the month, which I
     always 
keep holy. From the result of my own personal observation, I am
     fully convinced
that there has formerly been a population much more numerous
than exists here at present. It appears that: 2) During the night
a band of robbers entered the village, plundered the houses, and
     killed
the inhabitants; or 3) Leaving it entirely to the imagination
we descend into the depths of “time beyond,” and trace these
     remains
back six hundred years, from the ages of trees, and other data.
(N.B. — The longest questions ought generally to be placed last.)
4) Contented and thankful, after having visited here, we return
to our retired and peaceful habitation. The little bleak farm,
sad and affecting in its lone and extreme simplicity, smiled when, 
in inverted order, various birds rose singing, from highest to
     lowest, 
in a chorus of forms, over the solitude. In order to pass the rest 
of the day in meditation and prayer, I ascended the high hills of 
     B — , 
on the fifth day of the month, which I always keep holy. Thy skies
     are 
as blue, thy groves are as sweet, thy fields are as verdant, thy
     crags 
are as wild, as they were in those early days, when, compelled 
by violent persecution to quit his native land, a rabbi wandered
     over
barren wastes and dreary deserts. At last, fatigued and nearly
     exhausted, 
he came to this village. In order to pass the rest of the day in
     meditation 
and prayer, on the fifth day of the month, which I always keep
     holy, 
I ascended the high hills of B — . Early one summer morning, before 
the family was stirring, an old clock, that, without giving its
     owner any 
cause of complaint, had stood for fifty years in a farmer’s
     kitchen, 
suddenly stopped. I ascended the high hills of B — , on the fifth 
day of the month, which I always keep holy, in order to pass the
     rest 
of the day in meditation and prayer.

The Minor Poets

One knows nothing of their life. The sea
has taken all. I have no boat, and no 
companions. Only one thing is left: my love 
for you.

One follows hunches. One debates the established
rules. In effect, one completes — in this latter 
half of a divided century — an anthology of ten volumes
of three hundred pages each, all in small type.

O Penelope, it’s only chance that brought you unlucky
Ulysses; looking at your careful writing on this package
I feel the weight of my own torments. 
You accuse me of indolence. I only want to listen 
to your account of suffering.

The Total Solar Eclipse

Our sun is one of the ordinary stars. It may even be below
the average. But if we would understand the other stars, we must 
complete a study of our own. Several of its most interesting
     portions
are invisible; our knowledge incomplete until these portions
     understood;
the interior, for example, is invisible. The spherical body which
     is popularly 
called “sun” is bounded by an opaque photosphere — and this which
     we see
is insignificant. The sun-lit sky prevents effective search by
     everyday methods.
The sun is black. Apparatus should be set up, adjusted, tested
and used; and time should be available for retrial. The point-image
of a distant star includes all the details, and must be studied
     whole,
whereas the sun can only be studied in detail. It is not too much 
to say that in many respects the sun is as enigmatical as ever.
The last word on the subject is by Professor P., who has deduced
the following interesting results: that the sun is primarily
     invisible except
at eclipse; that its superlatively interesting features constitute 
an insignificant part of its mass; that our knowledge of the sun
is based entirely on a study of peripherals; that eccentricity is
     possible
but inexplicable; that four telescopes, making three photographic
     exposures each,
secure negative images of one hundred and sixty-two stars; that
     such images 
are recognizable and known; that stars in such images are entirely
     black; 
or otherwise invisible; that what is probable does not seem to
     account 
for the observed perturbations.

Austria Lower to Bisectrix

An entire life devoted to pairs: works published 
in two parts; sin understood both actual and original;
honor and condemnation; and death, still in the enjoyment
of these two dignities.

But rage continues to completion. “I’d be a butterfly,”
he offered, but then: “Oh, no, we never mention her.”
Other light and graceful songs are forgotten for mismanagement,
anxiety, financial difficulties, ill health. The citadel stands
empty. Letters received there, though affected in manner, 
show a real mastery of style emphasizing idiomatic elements.

He lived at the foot of the mountain, and was famous
as a thief and a swindler. The object of the story 
is to establish the connection between these attributes
and their incarnate representations. The interpretation is
     expounded
in two treatises, the one on the motion of the earth, 
the other on the fixity of the stars.

Cf: The well known case recorded in Des Indes à 
la planète Mars in which the automatist produced writing in
an unknown character, which purported to be the Martian language.
The hand and arm are insensible; she guides her hand not by 
sight but by some special extension of the muscular sense.
A patient in an attack of hysteria, to whom appeals are made 
in vain, can sometimes be induced to answer in writing
questions addressed directly to the hand.

Now we find the answers to two mysteries: one, making
more or less a loud noise, bearing an inscription in monkish Latin,
a name or distich on its function; and the other, a monster
more or less goblin-like, howling, with many forms and more
haunts, stalking the country where nurses frighten children with
     its name.

Glass, Stained

Theoretically this is no less effectually to be done 
by the “primitive” than by the “realist”: two artificial masses,
lighted by a lamp and viewed by a telescope from the outside,
conspire to pull together. Efforts at abstraction
lead to universal application. Meaninglessness? A condition,
imaginary — a sort of “Mrs. Harris” or “Mrs. Grundy,”
who typifies the disciplinary control of the conventional,
the tyrannical pressure of the opinion of neighbors. 
Where it is lost, conscious attempts to restore it 
lead to absurd misplacements; consider humble, humor,
even honor. Or feverish changes: captured by insurgent
peasants; re-taken by the Duke; deprived of privileges;
resolved on a pacific policy and attracting foreign capital;
sharing, to the full, the national desire for expansion.
And at their command, of transparent colors: blue, green,
purple or amethystine, amber, brown, and rose; and 
of opaque colors, white, black, red, blue, yellow, green, 
and orange.

Some Knowledge

Shall I now speak something of my sentiments concerning poesy?
It must be confessed or supposed at least, that there are seasons
when it is hard to suppress the exuberant flow of lofty sentiments.
But when a subject is proposed to your thoughts, consider
whether it be knowable at all, or no; and then whether
it be not above the reach of your inquiry; and consider again
whether the matter be worthy of your inquiry at all; and then 
how far (according to age, station, capacity, your chief design and
     end).
Query, cui bono? The glory of God? Little tricks and deceits,
by sliding in or leaving out such words as change the situation
should be abandoned and renounced by all honest searchers
after truth. To what purpose? For your own advantage? Is it not
     enough
to determine the truth, or to forbid any proposition the title 
“axiom” — ? What may be enough is just indifference. A warm zeal 
ought never be employed. I believe there is a God, and that
     obedience 
is due to him from every reasonable creature; this I am most
fully assured of, because I have the strongest evidence, since
it is the plain dictate both of reason and of revelation. Some
     effects
are found out by their causes, and some causes by their effects.
Yet I would lay down this caution: No man is obliged to learn and 
know everything; yet all persons are under some obligation.

Kite

Granting our connection, it is nonetheless subject to review and
     reform;
relatio est fictio juris — relation is a fiction 
of the law — yet the laws seem secure, confident in their
     simplicity
and arrogantly ambiguous when need be. The kite
flies higher, or is it just further away? The relationship we crave
seems stubbornly impossible; thus go hopes based on pictures.
One sorry look cannot reverse this situation. One is born 
in a direction, top-down, you might say; it is the global trend, 
large arrows, that cause today’s frustration.

The development of a science is only the discovery of what
is already in existence; in an incredibly short time
the introduction of the principles of this system to your
     consciousness
will be appreciated and accepted. Is speed really the issue? Of
     course
one can tabulate and manipulate ad infinitum, one can meditate
even while walking in the street. One should accomplish something
     of importance
every minute spent — in other words — in every sixty seconds’ worth
of distance run, spun out, burned into one’s mind and hands.
You must be your own schoolmaster; you must recognize that you are
     always
in need; and you must be ready to practice any severities against
     yourself
in order to gain this, unsolitary, end.

Now I lift my eyes and see the universe full of magnificent
     promise.
The kite is dangling. What I think of as l’histoire (nf)
is more apparent — a predilection to shorthand self-taught,
shaded eyes in the sun, a certain laziness over a cup
of tea, gameness for a new exertion. The flight
is consistent, even though she feigns to contravene her own laws.
When a man becomes aware of this aimlessness, then descends on him
the misery of disillusionment. Must one have a fixed purpose,
sufficient determination, to accomplish a thing? Isn’t light
a natural electricity? In what units does one measure activity?
Should we make the supreme effort to master this system, or alter
     our own
to conform to it? One learns much by analogy.

Evidently bigger and further would change things. Conditions
could improve. The compilation, computation, and condensation of
     facts
might help. Still I believe there is no such thing as inaction.
You have resources now at your command that would save you
70% of the time and effort you would normally devote: are you
using them? If you are not, won’t you take us into your confidence?
Can’t you let us make everything just as easy as possible? I assure
     you
it (your confidence) will be respected and appreciated.
Dear Sir, and Dear Madam, are decidedly stiff and formal;
they haven’t the warmth typical of real life; they are not
     applicable
to personal convictions; and it is with a feeling of genuine
     anxiety 
that I again write you regarding our long-overdue accounting. 
Yes, you have the idea exactly. I have found it pays 
in the saving of energy, in the wear and tear of this business
     life, 
to mix in a little “sentiment,” just for lubricant, you know. My
     hands 
are burning. I am dangling by a string. I have no special desire to
     tell this in detail — 
the point is this — General Garcia is dead, but there are other 
Garcias. He is wanted in every city, town, and village. In every
     office,
shop, and factory. He is needed, and needed badly — 
may you never fail to find “Garcia.”

You have at your hand a new experience with which to meet
situations that confront you. Not the kite, which fell into the sea
some time ago, or the shiny trail of string racing over the sand;
     not the crazy
undulations of a thing at rest, or soothing determination of one
in motion; the system is based on the use of old habits,
instead of requiring the formation of hundreds of new ones.
This is what removes it from memory, and establishes it as 
principle: that all unnecessary effort has been removed. Dramatic
     stories,
which make the nerves tense and suspend the breath, help one to
     forget
the restrictions on one’s capabilities — and repetition, like a
     tonic,
has a relaxing effect. These are the means of developing
inattention. An endless copying of the words and thoughts of
     others,
the law of growth, the law of unfoldment, the law of relaxation
and repetition . . . Perfection is the goal to be reached. Dictate
to yourself. Perfect work. All is from within, out. Herein is 
direction. A declarative sentence is followed by a period.

We know you will like this work.
Some will like it more than others.
You will all like it in time.
There is little for you to do.
Do that as well as you can.
We all like to do this work.

Portrait

Expressing oneself fluidly but also willingly
pushing aside old campy rules of comportment
and demarcation; also new concerns like health care
and environmental litigation — what’s left is a place setting,
arranged exquisitely for seven courses beginning near mid-summer’s
     night
and lasting nigh our reentry into the thick urban atmosphere
looking salty and exhausted; sunburned and cheerful;
no one project has occupied us fully in your absence,
but with your return our focus will readjust and you, you, you
would, and may, easily and gracefully express the right thought
and to you therefore this work is respectfully dedicated.

*

He is seated with a book in his left hand, 
possibly his own poem on the landscape which may be seen
through the window on the right; his costume and headgear
seem very unbecoming. He appears to be laughing at himself.
Standing on a hill in the landscape outside is an unidentified
     woman
in a green satin dress; her fair hair falls over her bare 
shoulders, an open book is propped against a skull;
with her is a man in a fur cloak with a white collar,
his right hand is open as if to grasp something.
He has an air of dignity which reminds one of a Roman emperor.
A woman is in the room, lying nude on a white couch;
she betrays the utmost delight in voluptuous sensuality.
Her fair hair falls over her bare shoulders,
an open book is propped against a skull.
He is on her lap and clutches at a corner of her cloak.
She is in the act of removing the scarf in which 
he is wound. He lies naked on the couch 
trying to catch the floating fabric in his hands.

*

But there are so many clichés about looking
like a Roman emperor. Anyone aiming to reinforce
image with identity, a kind of psychological 
rime-riche, should take note: pitfalls in marble
are many. Better in coin, or a bronze as some
god or allegorical figure. This sort of ambiguity
is exemplary: “Female bust, wrongly called
Berenice, as there is no resemblance with the 
coins bearing her image and superscription.” The 
lips are covered with a thin layer of copper. The
hair dressed high is kept back by a double plait.
The goddess Artemis (vengeful) is suggested, but the bust
is most likely a portrait . . . 

“She was a golden brown presence, burned by 
the Tuscan sun and with a golden glint in her
warm brown hair. She wore a large round coral
brooch and when she talked, I thought her
voice came from this brooch.”

*

It is one of those moments when you wonder at the building
or at the Building of the Wonder, when even a minor castle
distracts for an eternal-type moment, there on the first level
over the sea, which is naturally shining, and the southern sky
is from this perspective also marvelous — such observations
to be packed away tightly in barrels, perhaps, and stored
in one of the available towers (little imagination has been devoted
to their functional resurrection). And now at a second level
we find thirty candles and as many monks, all outdoors and exposed
to the salty air on which we are about to remark when, from
     underground,
our own gate emerges clearly marked with international symbols
     meaning
come in, please, for water, a newspaper, and our eternal delight — 
or is it banishment that will be pronounced from this, final level,
the spacious apartments of perhaps an abbot? Or other
     ecclesiastical
prince? Our lady is ambiguous but steadfast in her encouragement
to use and enjoy these, our natural facilities.

The Book as a Planet

The earth moves through empty space around the sun. The old idea
of the earth resting on, or being supported by something, is
     erroneous.
The earth rests on nothing.

A book or other inanimate object placed on a support will remain at
     rest
until something or somebody moves it. If the book be thrown up
     through the air,
it ought to keep on moving upward forever, because it has no more
     power
to stop moving than to begin to move. 

Our earth moves through empty space around the sun, and must continue so moving.

(Space is not absolutely empty, but is everywhere filled with a very
     tenuous 
substance called ether. Wherever the telescope reveals the presence
     of stars, 
or the eye reads words on a page, we must believe the ether also
     extends.)