Dust (To Grind By Pickaxe)
Our hands are hot and raw with the stones we have laid,
We have built a tower of stone high into the sky.
We have built a city of towers.
Our hands are light, they are singing with emptiness.
Our souls are light. They have shaken a burden of hours. . . .
What did we build it for? Was it all a dream? . . .
Ghostly above us in lamplight the towers gleam . . .
And after a while they will fall to dust and rain;
Or else we will tear them down with impatient hands;
And hew rock out of the earth, and build them again.
--Conrad Aiken, "The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light"
and if you're smart, you'll learn by heart
what every artist knows--
you must sing your scales
and your arpeggios