Music in a Spanish Town

In the street I take my stand

with my fiddle like a gun against my shoulder,

and the hot strings under my trigger hand

shooting an old dance at the evening walls.

Each saltwhite house is a numbered tomb

each silent window crossed with blood;

my notes explode everywhere like bombs

when I should whisper in fear of the dead.

So my fingers falter, and run in the sun

like the limbs of a bird that is slain,

as my music searches the street in vain.

Suddenly there is a quick flutter of feet

and children crowd about me,

listening with sores and infected ears,

watching with lovely eyes and vacant lips.

Cordoba, 1936