Sarangi Sorrow
janine canan
Against the carnelian sky
a young man sits on the palace pool steps
and plays the Sarangi his father once played.
Bow to string, he plays his soul.
Together we wander the white-walled labyrinth,
kneel upon dirt, drink sweet mint --
he can tell by the way I listen
some violent music has shattered my heart.
Oh, nothing sobs like the Sarangi --
it whines in the empty cavity,
it saws through grief till you worship grief
releasing its sundering song.
The young man's eyes are bright springs.
Each note climbs out of mud dripping gold.
For nothing surpasses the grandeur of Sarangi sorrow --
sixteen thousand miles I voyaged to hear this sound,
that drowns discarded love in raptured joy.
Oh, nothing is sweeter than humiliation Sarangi plays --
like jasmine it rises from tinkling dust.
Beneath the towers in deepening desert dusk
a young man plays like his grandfathers;
for queens and strangers he plays
till night has drunk every tone. Where are you --
Sarangi cries -- among all these milky moping golden stars.
