From the Archives : Mozartkugel (July 2015)

The same confection you pinch

like grapeshot is shown

there on the cover

of the octagonal box

in your other hand, undressed

of its golden foil

and bisected, its center identical

to the pistachio green

of your vest. And that look

on your face, at once

blasé and pissed, that betrays

just how much you resent

your audience, being

made for nothing more

than to tempt us

with your pursed lip

artifice to ask

ourselves How badly

do I want this — to try

what I’ve never tasted

as part of me — to share

in the fame of the man

in my mouth?

*

But the affront melts

as we follow the course

of your smile, strained

into the dimple

of your left cheek, its surface

guached as though flush

with fluorescent light

landing on powdered skin

pocked with eggplant

and orange peel

as are relics

of industrial printing.

*

No, you aren’t so much

Mozart as you are

the taste of Mozart, maestro of cake

and cotton candy

and little chocolates that jostle

in their boxes, like the one

you hold up to show us

Here — this is it —

the truth of what’s inside —

a ball full of me

just for you.

One of 90 million

produced at a factory

on the outskirts of Salzburg

and exported to over

30 countries per annum

wherein a crumb

of the spirit

abides. A Mozart

in the ether

unborn, waiting

for what he always was

destined to become

the Mozart of.

*

Still, I can imagine

squeezing out of a putrid

basement toilet stall

in the Ringstraße McDonalds

and find you standing

there — a man the same

as I am, waiting

for me to vacate, your look

acknowledging Yes —

how amusing — we are

as brothers in the unsavory

demands of our bodies

and then never see it again,

the face of a man who forgets

mine as well. Turning

away from me, would I be met

with the back of your coat

and bow of your wig

or was that part of you

left blank, the pulp

of your polystyrene ribbing

bare-assed to meet

the dark of a confiserie

closed on Sunday?

Or is it you again, mirrored

in marzipan breeches,

ruby tailcoat, foam whig and

whipped egg merengue

ruffle shirt, one side

determining the outline of

what’s behind it?

*

I encounter another

you, stood up

outside a gift shop

in the Rotenturmstraße

just when a passing

teenager slaps

the candy box, causing

you to spin like a thaumatrope

and, sure enough,

it’s you again — trapped

in the outlines of him

glued to your back.

The Kugel flickers

as you spin — both

here and here — the bend

of your elbow plotting

the only place it could be

on either side

of you, your hand

twinned to hold

each in orbit around

a missing center, facing

the other for no one

else — except

that your likeness

on the foil is printed

looking outward, and so

away from itself.

Not even you can be

bothered by the spectacle

of your own Mozartness.

*

As your rotation slows

and stops with the same you

facing me as before

it’s like you’ve shown me

what your vessel

exists to keep away

from the conflagration

that is hunger

in the living world —

In the space between

my fingers where you see

the Mozart Ball, I in fact measure

the mass of your desire —

the candy of your mind’s eye

in relation to all that

surrounds and ultimately isn’t

this Mozart Ball right here —

one might even say

that Mozart Balls precede

the very want for Mozart Balls

in that they eternally

exceed it

as our souls yearn

for what they’ve never

tasted — such is the misery

you unseal when you

bite down —

that you won’t be

able to stop yourself

wanting more.

*

A few hours later and I’m sat

on a bench inhaling

a twenty-piece of Chicken

McNuggets, watching

a young woman Chaplinwalk

up and down Kärnterstraße

in whig and whiteface,

her justaucorps and knickers

spray-painted gold

like some porcelain fetish

come to life. For dessert I fish

the Mozartkugel

I’ve been saving all day

out of my tote bag, skin its

finely hammered leaf,

tensored squishy between

index finger and thumb

that leave their prints

stuck in the melted surface

muddy on my tongue,

break the seal with a bite

and return my attention

to the artist, now wobbling

alongside two girls in burqas

who laugh as she fleetly

plays her piccolo made of air,

then sneaking up behind

a teenaged couple as they go in

for the kiss, tapping the boy

on the shoulder to wag

her gloved finger

disapprovingly in their faces.

*

A performance I’ve

soundtracked to Kiss my ass

in B-Flat Major (KV 231)

with you part minstrel, part what

I think approximates

an 18th Century fop

and thus, whether rightly

or wrongly, associate

with the historical man, the mortal

Mozart whose placeholder

you are, less you

than a version of you

an actor played

to middling acclaim

in a film based on a play

where your life was recomposed

into a series of vignettes, and where

the ironclad ghost

of a murdered Commendatore

was mingled with the shade

of your father, his austere

bicorne touched

with dust.

*

The week following his death,

you wrote a poem instead

to your dear starling

more recently departed —

that Lieber Narr, darling fool.

It was after you’d wandered

into the pet store

where you first encountered him

that you scratched in your pocketbook

27 May 1784 — Bird — Starling —

34 kreutzer — followed by notation

of the tune you taught him

to sing there in his cage

maybe at the proprietor’s invitation

Ah, Herr Mozart —

here’s a curiosity for you —

look — this fellow without fail

will repeat any melody — go ahead

whistle something of yours

and you will find him

quite the pupil. And so you did

the opening bars

of the allegretto from your newest

Piano concerto in G major (KV453)

though he imperfectly

returned your theme, it’s true,

pausing on the last beat

of the first measure

and singing G sharp in the next.

Or was it because

he improvised, improved,

gave back your music

made his own, that underneath

the bars you penciled in

How wonderful!

*

That Vogel Staar (meaning

both starling and stern,

unyielding) knows neither

that he’s dead

nor that you remained,

left to mourn him

as he sings of Mozart

in heaven, frees the melody

of your grace notes,

embellishments — of you —

the Mozart Ball Mozart,

a vibration, a ripple waning

in the wake of a man

who as Mozart could not be

other than himself.

*

Does music even exist

outside of its performance —

the opera that brings the stage

to life, characters breath,

their words to sing

harmonies unheard as

unplayed —

or do we but interfere

in your self-adequacy? A perfection

that knows not

how it sounds. A clamor

of wings that is music

played, taken off in the reading

as fingers frailly

instrument the air

of halls echoing, alive

with voices, mimicry of birds

in true song.

*

Listen —

only what has ceased can be

abstracted, and only

what is abstract

shut up

to its essence — you are

not ball but man

brimming with gore —

your ears can but hear

one note at a time

after another — that’s why

you fill me

with disgust — with nougat

pistachio marzipan

ventriloquy — but when

you unwrap my body

chewed and swallowed it down

I enter your blood —

so trace amounts of me live

in every love handle —

it’s not the music

that’s mine —

no — it’s your hearing —

your tastebuds

receiving

as if a missing piece

your mind melts to know

completion — well

here I am

inside of you.

 *

I swallow what’s left

of the liquified Mozart Ball,

my gums coated

in buttery cud, some still

lodged in a cavity bleeding

a faint slimy twinge

of sugar. Not exactly satisfying

as a dessert in itself, gone

mute before it could

fully register on the tongue.

I notice my reflection

in the dark storefront across

from where I’m sitting —

blue Oxford shirt, shaved head

and drawstring shorts. How cartoonish

this costume seems, as though

belonging to some

bygone era

no living person would ever

dress like anymore.

I watch the man there

crack open a tallboy of Gösser,

close my eyes, lean back

and take a long dram

of lukewarm beer just when

I feel a tapping on my shoulder.