for Stephen, with love

Always precisely three rocks, no more no less. Two rocks aren’t enough to indicate “some rocks” and four rocks are more than necessary. Three rocks precisely.

Sixty masks originally, now more than two hundred. There are roughly six types: Old Man, Elder, Woman, Man, Demons, Ghosts and Spirits, each one carefully neutral and ambiguous.

Unstressed stressed, unstressed (breath) stressed unstressed stressed; romance, nature imagery, end rhymes, caesura. Easier in the Italian, but then what isn’t?

The pianist paces onto stage, slow, dignified, settles determinedly onto the bench, inhales, exhales,
waits for four minutes and thirty three seconds.

No more no less.