Mandolino Plucked with the Plectrum of Remembrance

The strings of my mandolino have the farewell of memory

Borrowed from the imagination of hands

That once wondered on a distant balcony

How the city below remembers full moons

I was given that mandolino

To hear myself grow with time

I did not know that the melody of my grandfather’s tears

Would stay silent in the space

Where I became what I once was

Unknowing and grateful

And I accepted that

While the dead are done with the losses they kept secret

I had to learn how to mourn my own losses

Alone

On the strings of a mandolino

When my hands were ready again

To play

PS/ This 75-years old mandolino was given to me by my grandfather, a professional musician, almost 60 years ago. I kept it silent since. Today, I heard it play a melody borrowed from my own imagination.

June 18, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020