Come Quiet Please

he manipulated the dials with scientific care until he knew he was zeroed in to a station. Then he switched on the powerful Zenith overrider and caught four channels, four conversations on his row of monitors. Gently he lifted the accordion from its case and turned it on. He hummed as it gathered force, then depressed a resonant chord. "Howdy, out there," he spoke into the microphone. "I know you have things to say to each other, you travelers of the night and truckers and bored people on the hill with the big antennas. This is the first time I've had full power since lightning run in on the old set last year, but I've got it up to where it ought to be now, and I can get my messages through to a whole world. That's good, and all I have for you folks is a song. It's gonna last about six or seven minutes, and then I'll be out of here. I want to dedicate it to the memory of Marjorie, and I guess the song could be called 'Marione,' even though she'd roll over if she knew I was doing this. This is Wade Timberly, and this is music for Miss Margie." It was a beautiful song, and he made it up as he played it. He used all the dexterity and complexity he had picked up from three decades of playing hymns and fight songs and polkas, but he used it to create an almost-transcendent simplicity. A song about clouds and rivers, about wind misbehaving in the trees and a blue heron lifting a fish in its beak. Dunes changed shape in the distance, and trawlers lifted their laden nets against the winter-blurred sun. A grackle lit on a garden trellis. Beach Elum blossoms were followed by fruit right as medallions and not at all sour. Migrating birds arced through the notes. Static from the CB cracked and sparkled, the puzzled voices of late-night listeners seeking information or solace or his attention through the chilling air. He didn't need for them to listen, but he didn't mind. He squeezed the bellows and his fingers danced a courtly dance of life wildly on the worn white keys. Come Quiet Please Come quiet please and hold my hand; Make haste for there is no more day; The shadows weave a wedding band Around a cloud of darkest grey. My lover's gone and left me now, My love, my dear, my sweetest face, And now I seek with my own words To fill that empty hollow place. My love, he loved me for a time When I was young and time was strong; Now silently a leaden chime Admits he did me somehow wrong. There's nothing left for me to love, No heart within to justify, No thought, no mind, no reason why And naught but grief left for a sky. -Barbara Deatherage 35 ...