Sonata for Ocean Organ in C Minor
by Sarah Ens
An exposition
you’d read descent
was the closest thing to
grace, and you’d try
anything once, twice, it’s not
like you said you were looking
to get reborn, just suggested
this was for your health
when asked, which you were,
many times.
A development
grip flippers to your feet
in a crowd of concert-divers,
most middle-aged, paired, leaning
hands onto shoulders, bulging sticky
wet suits. one woman wears
a leather jacket. you watch
her fold its arms flat, slide
keys to its pocket. you pat
yourself down,
consider what you too
should leave on shore.
floating from the harbour you
feel shivered, scuba-ed. barges
bellow, too far to see. you feed
a gull one of your fries and it’s
ungrateful while four men sing
shanties from the railing. catch
the bassist’s eye as he
wipes sea spray from his chin.
you know already, it’ll be
an unsteady somersault
below the waves.
maybe you’d hoped for the feeling of
your pastor’s palm
on the crown of your head,
water lukewarmed from a shallow
clay bowl rivering your neck
but instead, slipped
open-mouthed into Atlantic,
your chest does not believe
its oxygen. the organist is small,
you think, smaller than she
should be. her fingers,
waiting, curl like melting ice.
she bends on her bench. begins
and you miss the silence of hall,
raised baton, even
that one stray cough’s
ricochet, didn’t expect
terror churning breath
through pipes, bloomed
then swallowed, kelp
reaching tender for silver
spires, toying in the blue.
there is no disappearing, only
opening clean, enormous,
the water too
full, fish low, startled, specks of
silt, and limbs
treading, an angel choir
left in the flood.
kick soft.
A recapitulation
it’s impossible
to dive into a cold body
without breaching
changed.
it’s impossible
to hear much of
anything above
the moan of metal
pipe
except, sometimes,
the blue of skin
unclasped
by god.
Composers' Note:
For "Sonata for Ocean Organ in C Minor" by Sarah Ens we tried to remain true to the struggle it embodies between the sacred and the profane. We followed the sequence of events quite closely, starting above water with the sounds of creaking boats, tightening ropes, men singing sea shanties, and finally diving down into the bay to take in the music, trying to come to terms with the opposition between the divine and the earthly in the depths.