! ! A Tribute To The Bbc 'Young Musician Of 2008' Poem by Michael Shepherd

This is what love
sounds like. This
is how you know
the heart is only ever one.

This boy, he’s twelve years old,
he’s standing on the platform
in the huge hall. He’s simply
waiting to play himself to you.

The trombone is now a few inches
shorter than he is. When he started,
it was bigger than he was.

He begins to play, Can this sweetness
have come from this contraption?
If Pythagoras was lecturing tonight
on music, measure, the harmony of spheres,
he’d have brought his tape measure
in case we needed proof.

If giraffes could sing,
they would sing to this trombone,
knowing themselves beautiful like it,
knowing that they both know
where music comes from.
How far it goes.

The sound says,
purity sounds like this. Listen.

The sound says,
did you know that innocence
can contain the whole of wisdom?
Listen.

The sound says,
did you know that experience
can know itself in music?
Listen.

The sound says,
I am music. This
Is what music is. I am
all music in this moment.

If tears were joys, they
would sound like this.
If joys were tears, they
would both sound like this.

The sound says,
I was made for this.
Listen.