Guitar Lesson

Look through this window, see them
leaning forward slightly, as though they were at prayer,
huddled over strings, frets, the pupil and the teacher,
making modest music, the appropriate chords, the proper notes.

Rembrandt has painted this, or something like it -
the perfect homeliness of quiet lives
at certain moments:
and the cats on the sofa, fruit
in the bowl, the shining wood

are part of it, when I walk in
becoming audible. The song
absorbs the scene, and fills the room
to bursting like a berry in its season -
two sounding instruments that resonate,
a voice that croons an earthly hallelujah.

David Callin


If you have any thoughts on this poem, David Callin  would be pleased to hear them.