A Curious Bird
Deep in the jungle of Creative Arts,
where Bach is arranging his soprano’s parts,
Schubert still struggles with chords diminished
as his latest work remains unfinished.
Here Haydn and Webern argue tonality
whilst Wordsworth questions Plath’s mentality
…and Van Gogh waits in a hospital corridor,
as Pollock pours paint on the studio floor.
Whilst Dali creates with raving fanaticism
Wagner composes with seething chromaticism
and as Rimbaud’s verses verge hysterical
the Bard is scripting pastoral historical tragical.
Here Donne and Marvell look on in shock
as Alexander Pope is raping his lock,
and Leonardo appears to grow his hair at will -
Rossini, meanwhile, prefers a trim in Seville.
The piano of Liszt lies beaten and smote,
but Schoenberg’s still searching for that last twelfth note,
And Monet paints yet another lily…
which Ingres opines as looking quite silly.
Where Greenberg discusses the form he favours
and Paul Cezanne is drying his bathers,
McCubbin and Streeton go camping with Roberts
and Tolkien lies dreaming of giants and hobbits.
While critics attack his music bitterly,
Berlioz, in the jungle, is writing to Harold, in Italy.
It’s here that Debussy waits throughout the morn
for the arrival of an unpunctual faun
and John Cage ventures where no-one has dared
- catching Brendel’s piano quite unprepared.
It’s here where the strains of Verdi are heard
we find long-legged Dick – a curious bird.
(Adapted from a poem by Greg Stone, 1981)