Partita

It was his choice to call me now, scaring the sleep out of my nights and lurking around my days.

God in whom I don’t really believe, except as inspiration for the kindest instincts and most torrid, passionate music ever mustered by humankind, please tell me. Because we’re made of both things, kindness and craving. If you did make us, that’s the complicated clay you used, those two ingredients in equal measure. So, you tell me. Which one is right?
Oh! God.

I played Gaspard de la Nuit just for Sigurd that spring, all three parts, and explained the story poems behind each one. First is “Ondine,” the flirtatious water nymph, and last comes “Scarbo,” a wiry goblin that comes out at night to terrify you, scrambling all around the bed and up the walls. The middle movement, “Le Gibet,” is very slow and sad, with a B-flat octave tolling like a bell all the way through.