sealed

There was this buried canister from a long time ago - 100 years - to be raised, jack-hammered out of the cement block in front of the knoll where the orchestra played. I had the best view in back, solitary triangle player of the symphony, on my feet at the ready. I was excited - what treasures were hermetically sealed away so long ago in 1912? So excited I dropped my sheet music and it fluttered to the windy horn section. Yes, the self-important conductor with the banana proboscis demanded that even the tuxedo-ed triangle man follow the separate line of dots above the regular staff of notes. 'I'll wing it', is what I tried to tell him if he'd just easily read my lips, but he'd have none of that insubordination. I saw him grow bright crimson when he easily read my lips to where I believed he could shove my cold copper triangle and leather-handled wand.

By this time anyway there was a massive stampede by the crowd, chairs falling like dominoes, with a few of our lead violins stampeded. I didn't care anymore and walked off, triangle heaved, and soon found myself along a shady path towards Shady Grove Cemetery, silent and cool amongst the lime trees. Along the way I caught my girl, fourth chair violin, behind a hedge, kissing the six foot four bassoon soloist, and I was feeling beyond pretty low on the way to zero. A black cat, looking as though it had two stomachs, slunk by like a snake in slow motion, and three magpies were playing tag with some peeled away bark. I walked on, watching my polished shoes, pinched face reflected, and found myself in a most remarkably quiet place where the grassy path met a section of burial plots with singular headstones, lovingly oblique and modestly engraved with lower-case surnames.

I saw one grave adorned with three distinct angles in scintillating red, radiant from the lantern light sifting through the leaves. Dreamily drawn to it I removed my jacket, stretched out on my stomach and pencil sketched it on the back of the concert program while the two-stomach cat watched from a safe distance, and a few moments later there was a disturbing noise in the direction of the gazebo, sounding like water hurrying through an old fountain coming alive in Spring. Later I read in the paper how someone had dug up the canister in 1914 and took everything out and left a note with one word: Fools!


image: Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow