Tympanum (The Troubadour)
By Jehanne Mehta
I am not any thing you give a name to,
There is nothing I am bound to do;
I stand within the circle of my freedom;
There is nowhere I am bound to go;
But if you should wish to circumscribe me,
Bend your thinking round into an O,
Stretching the finest skin across it,
Tightened like the drawn string on a bow.
I am nothing but an instrument of hearing,
A membrane, taut as ever any drum,
All senses fused together to make one.
Strike me with your name and with your beauty;
Vibrating with your pain and with your love,
I shall pierce the very stars with song.
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