Healing Music

©Amanda Forestwood

“Music heals.”

It was among the things her psychotherapist proposed to help her find herself again. She had been down a very silent, dark and unnerving path for too long, she was now struggling to find the light. And she could use all the help she could get.

He had drifted away because it was too much to handle. But he could now see that she was trying her best.

He left her a note on the front door that prompted her to the backyard.

The violin was there: sitting majestically on the garden chair. Uniquely crafted. Just like her.

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

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The sound of gloom

There was a poor person in the metro the other day playing a famous song on his guitar. He was dressed decently. Wasn’t begging really. His voice was imbued with feeling. He sounded almost professional. He sang from the heart and that was evident. It made you want to give him something. Some change to show your appreciation for the way he was striving to make a living.

Perhaps he could have searched for a ‘regular’ job. But everyone knows these are hard to find in a country where ‘crisis’ has become an everyday term.

At least he was giving melody to a train ride. And you could see the passengers actually stop looking at their phones for a minute and letting their mind wander at his tune.

You were almost mesmerised to give him spare change. Coins whose possession to you may not have made a difference. Perhaps it was the cost of your daily cup of coffee. But to him it was a measure of appreciation. Of the fact that there were people out there who liked what he offered and who were willing to grant a helping hand.

There are many people who leave aside their dignity and in their despair decided to ask strangers for help. There are the ones who feel outcast from society. Whom we look at demeaningly and most often choose simply to ignore. There are the ones who cause controversial discussions of whether they are worth our pity or our ignorance, of whether they are choosing the easy road of begging instead of searching for a ‘real job’.

Everyone we meet carries their own story, their own burdens, their own heavy loads. But it is people like these that make you realise all that you have and how little you appreciate how lucky you in fact are. Because what you perceive as obvious and ‘normal’ is not so for many others.

The corner of notes

©Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

It was a corner in the house that belonged to him alone. One in which all worries and concerns would evaporate, converted into notes and music. It was a corner that hosted all of his instruments, his closest friends, those that accompanied him since he was a child. It was to them that he would seek refuge, where he would turn when something went wrong, but also when he wanted to celebrate. They knew best how to express it all: every emotion, every heartbeat.

This was the corner where life gained a meaning. Where he would feel, above all, understood.

 

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

An unexpected gift

© Björn Rudberg

For days, sorrow covered her heart like a dark cloud. She never expected it to break, snapping like a feeble twig. Her wooden cello was all she had left from her beloved grandfather. He was the one who had taught her to play and to allow music to soothe her soul. She felt closer to him whenever she plucked those strings.

But now it was gone and with it she feared his memory would also fade.

At church that night she longed for solace. But instead she found something more: a new cello, waiting for her to play a melody.

 

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

 

Curvy Dancer

Once the music began, she could feel the notes diffuse into her veins and flow into her system. Her entire body was taken over by the rhythm and all she could do was surrender to the melody. Her curves began to sway and she was soon prancing about like a thick elastic band. Melissa did not care she was curvy and did not fit into the stereotypes. She loved to dance and that was all.

Melissa was introduced to dancing like most little girls, through a tutu and pointes. She was a chubby little ballerina, but was the best in her class, something most people did not anticipate. Not even her own mother who had registered Melissa for dancing classes in the first place as a form of exercise and in the hope that the curves that had taken form early on would ‘straighten’.

The curves did not disappear. But Melissa’s love for dance grew.

After ballet, she underwent a period of revolution and reaction – she entered the world of hip-hop and breakdance and stunned onlookers with the elasticity of her body.

As she matured, and felt young men’s gaze on her, Melissa turned to contemporary dance, as a way of expressing what she could not utter. She got lost in the unscripted, abstract movements that took her mind off the challenges of adulthood and for that brief time made her carefree and wispy.

As she gathered experiences and passed through heartbreaks and the trials of relationships, Melissa moved onto other forms of dance – ballroom granted her grace and elegance, while Latin gave her room for expression, sassiness and vivacity.

But it was when she got acquainted with the tango that Melissa felt complete. When she met a dancing partner, who later became one for life; when she moved her feet to the rhythm with her eyes closed, succumbing to the passion and emotions the dance awakened within her. It was then that she felt most alive. When she danced, blocking out everyone and everything else. When she took off her dancing shoes with a revived sense of optimism that everything would be OK. All she had to do was believe it and dance to the rhythm in her heart.

 

N.B. April 29 is International Dance Day – a relevant article on the benefits of dance can be found here.

 

Also part of Daily Prompt: Curve

The singing nightingale

It was as beautiful as the dawn of a new day,
But as fragile as the thinnest twig of a newborn tree.
It sounded as exquisite as the chords of a divine symphony,
But it alone felt the pain hidden behind each note.

The nightingale had a simple appearance
There were no extravagant colours adorning its feathers
Yet inside it enfolded a heart brighter than gold.
It could love as selflessly and unconditionally as no other,
But that, no-one would ever know.

For unrequited love is the most terrible of all.
It never thanks you for the rose you painfully and bloodily gathered,
It never recognizes how you long for their companionship,
It can never acknowledge the actions they never saw you take.

So the nightingale sings.
It sings to soothe its broken heart.
It sings in the night to express its sorrow.
It sings when it can hide in the dark.
It sings in the hope that things will change tomorrow.

Take back the night

 

 

 

 

 

The silence of a room feels so much louder
When you’re not here.
Everything seem so much darker
without you near.

In every picture we had
we used to smile
so widely
so truly
so fully.

We’ll never know what happened.
What changed.
What never did.

But now…
Where do we go from here?
how can it all go on
without the fire of passion
to fight away the fear?

How easy it easy to melt away,
like ice in a summer heat.
To long for air or water,
like love is the only thing you need.

What are you waiting for?
What is it that you need?
When will life ever be complete?
Or just a bit like you’ve always dreamed?

So, what are you waiting for?
Get up, move, even if you fall.
Don’t you want to live and be free?
Don’t you want to accomplish at least one dream?

The time will never be right.
Nor the location or the night.
There never was a plan.
Just a lot of faith.

All you have to do is take a leap
and believe you can fly.

 

Also part of Daily Prompt: Baggage Check

If you need me, I’ll be by the door

Macy’s evening did not start out all that well. Her office had decided to host an all-in-one holiday evening, which meant they would all celebrate Secret Santa, Hanukkah, New Year and Three Kings all tonight. So they had to do the gift exchange thing, which had turned out strangely from the minute she picked out the name from the Santa hat.

How was she supposed to know Jay was a girl’s name? The only Jay she knew was Leno and he was all masculine.

So she had picked out an elegant black and silver silk tie for the supposed male receiver of the gift. She had no idea who Jay was anyway, as the office had so many external associates and there was not a lot of teamwork involved from other departments. So, she didn’t know her gift provider either. Anyhow, the minute the female Jay clapped in joy as she heard her turn was up to receive her secret gift, Macy froze and became paler than the icing on the Christmas cake. She handed the parcel with a trembling hand and barely managed to mutter anything.

She was lucky the female Jay liked to wear ties as accessories. She considered them luxurious fashion items and was thrilled by the “softness of the real silk”. So Macy got away with it.

Then, she didn’t want a piece of the Christmas cake or pudding, because she didn’t like the dried fruit they contained. So she decided instead to cut a piece of the other cake next to it. It appeared like a sponge cake and seemed tastier. It would fit better with her tea.

How was she supposed to know it was the Gallette des rois? And that they were supposed to cut it after the gift exchange was completed? With her lucky streak continuing, Macy even found the trinket in her piece. She couldn’t place the cake back now, without pushing and shoving and causing more crumbles. She was feeling a heatstroke approaching as her face reddened up. She decided it would be easier to just walk away.

So she took her porcelain tea cup, careful not to cause anymore destruction tonight, and stood by the door.

She hoped nobody would notice that the King’s Cake was already cut. But they did. And she appeared just as shocked as everybody else. But given the holidays, and the fact that the cake was in essence still whole, nobody paid too much attention to the “mishap”. But luck had it that Macy was awarded the very piece she had cut. With the trinket. Which meant she had to wear the pretend crown and be the centre of attention for the rest of the evening. Something which she absolutely despised.

The moment the music was on louder, though, everyone pretty much forgot about the gifts and cakes and all those things, and began to dance their troubles away.

Dean, a young man who worked in the next door department to Macy, even smiled at her and she blushed. She felt silly, flirting like a little girl. But then Frank Sinatra began to sing “Come fly with me” and Dean grabbed her hand and pulled her onto the dance floor.

Until that moment, all she could think about was being as close to the door as possible; so she could make a run for it. But dancing in the arms of a charming man, and letting everything else slide out of her mind, yes, that was definitely better.

 

Also part of Daily Prompt: Comedy of Errors

Turn away and slam the door

Melody was a bit of a hippie at times. She had days were she would only listen to country, and then others when she would abruptly switch to rock – it was exactly like that song said. But mood swings are apparently fitting to every woman, so that wasn’t strange. What truly suffocated Melody though, was the fact that some days she did not feel like singing at all.

It was the days when she felt her frustration with the world mounting inside of her, like a volcano ready to erupt. And it was precisely for that reason that she loved Halloween. Because she could really let it all go.

This year she was invited at a friend’s house for a Halloween party. Costumes were mandatory, and the entire house and yard were decorated with scary face-pumpkins with little candles glowing inside, as well as cobwebs, witch brooms, skeletons and the like. People apparently really like to be scared.

So Melody put on her cowgirl shoes and a western-style hat, but added a touch of Halloween to her makeup – she painted a bullet hole on her left cheek, one that left blood dripping onto her shirt. It was something that left many people impressed at how real it looked. One person even offered to find the first aid box for her.

Melody had been fired from her job this week, finding out the truth behind the saying that even if you work perfectly for 364 days a year, the slip-up on that one day is all you will be remembered for. So tonight, Halloween marked a new beginning too. A time to stop being the good girl she had to be, and conceal her feelings. Staying frozen in one place for too long, would just allow others to strike harder, she thought. So tonight it was time to let it go, turn away and slam the door. And that is exactly what she did.

Halloween enabled her to let her hair down, wear exactly what she wanted and ignore everything that was simply not going her way. After all, tonight was about remembering all those that are no longer with us, and they certainly would not want her depressed about something she has no power over. For Melody, Halloween served as a reminder, that we should enjoy life in its fullest, because it really is too short.

So go on, treat yourself to a festive cupcake and let it all go.

Happy Halloween!

 

Also part of Daily Prompt: No Time to Waste

What life sounds like

What does a roar sound like?

They tell me that when a footballer scores, the crowd “roars”. I don’t know what that sounds like.

All I see is people jumping up and down in the stands, with their faces mutating from the strain of excitement. They seem to be living every moment as if their life depends on that single goal. And when something goes wrong, you can see the blood gushing to their face, painting it red with anger.

They all seem to be yelling something at every instance, but I don’t know what it is.

I don’t like watching football. Everyone tells me that I am missing out from all the fun if no screaming is involved. But it is not my fault.

It is even worse when I go to a concert. Well, actually, when they drag me there and I just stare at the stage at people jumping up and down in what appears to be a contest of who will wear less clothes.

But I can’t hear anything.

I was born like this. Deaf.

I don’t know what a singing bird sounds like. Or what my parents’ voices are like.

I have never heard the crack of a biscuit, or the ruffling of leaves. Neither the sound of pages turning, or the beating of a heart. Nor the noise a jumping car makes, or the swish of waves.

I don’t know what music is. Or what it means to yell at the top of your voice to release the tension.

I never experienced the thrill of a good shout.

And I will never know what it means to roar like a lion when you are mad. Or sob and squeak like an infant when you are sad.

I wish I could hear a voice. Even an angry one. Just hear something.

I am living in a silent world. And the only thing I can hear is the sound of my heart breaking from it.