Sonata Mulattica

You find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford.

The Learned Pig, the Mechanical Turk, the Frenchman Tripping Over

the Plume in His Tricorner Hat—pass them by, the Season’s begun!

You can’t be seen slopping about the lower spectrum of open air

entertainment. Two shillings will buy you an hour of Musical Glasses

played by the delicious Miss Ford—no water in her cups,

yet they’ll warble with no need of a drop! Speaking of which,

you look dry, Sir: a tuppence a tipple. Keep it moving,

that’s the stuff; even if you’ve nowhere to get to—hurry on,

or you’ll be trampled in the press. Choices! That’s London:

You could follow the Janissary jingling through St. James

or stop in at Boodle’s if your game is on. If you must join in,

amateur glees are sung every Friday at the Crown and Anchor,

with bawdy lyrics to follow when the ladies depart.

Feeling noble? Attend Sunday’s benefit

for the castrato Tenducci, mired in debtor’s prison;

Mondays are for war orphans, Tuesdays, syphilitics,

Wednesdays, for the Lying-In at Hospital in Westminster.

Got a watch? Guard the fob. Push on, past the rug beater, broom peddler,

the boy hawking pickles, the child twitching her broken tambourine.

Dodge clattering carts and trundling barrows, clacking spokes and doors

slamming on the four-in-hands heading over to Rotten Row for a highbrow

hobnob. Say what? Can’t hear—what with fish hags haranguing

and unctuous urchins and flatulent hurdy-gurdies thumping out sea shanties

while rival churches toll the hours. You’d be better off examining

Charles Clagget’s Ever-Tuned Organ at the King’s Arms in Cornhill

or the Welsh harp at Whitehall. Failing a thirst for the exotic,

there’s the orchestra at Vauxhall Gardens, oratorios at Covent Garden,

Salomon’s subscription concerts in the rooms at Hanover Square.

Granted, nothing compares to the sight of Cotter the Giant

pulling a dwarf from his coat pocket (despite his size, Count Boruwlaski’s

quite successful with the ladies); but if you’re in the market for

condensed miracles, try the arias currently swelling Pantheon’s rafters—

remarkable sonorities emanating from the tiny form of the inimitable

Madame Mara, guaranteed to snap the cords of your heart.

Smaller still? Ten-year-old Clement’s always a good show, but for pure

flourish and spectacle, his rainbow opposite can be seen nightly

playing onstage at the Drury Lane Theatre: Little Mulatto Prince

George, fiddling away between Acts I and II of Handel’s Messiah.

wing hammering sky ember to flame

Pathological hit of the day: nigger on a golden chain.

Metaphorically, that is. The African

valet, the maidservant black

as aces in a hole, comely under that

there-but-for-God’s-grace-go-I

hue, a negative

to her ladyship’s

eggshell, blue-veined visage . . .

Who knew enhancement killed?

To achieve such alabaster,

lead-laced powders drilled

merrily into each cheek’s circumference,

while the gaily upholstered

Child of the Night (aka Jigaboo)

went free of ointments,

pastes, and paint; kept her dark bloom

and smiled as she curtsied, flashed

her scalding eye.

Diana wants to be a boy like me.

Stripped of turban, cravat, chemise:

perhaps a shirt of printed muslin

to blend in with the trees.

She is bright, she shines

like I do not. I’ll be

the firmament, backdrop

to her swift-skipping knees.

She goes out in the world alone,

her quiver bouncing, pointing

right my way, at me! No—

silk’s a better choice for someone

who doesn’t want to be a girl

or lady, prince or beggar’s son,

just needs to be let be.

A-hunting. Run, Diana, run!

See that fine thing with her wig all skyward,

primping along the Pall Mall?

I’m gonna shake my Jinglin’ Johnny

till she swoons from my fare-thee-well!

O here comes the Janissary,

Janissary, Janissary!

Here comes the Janissary

dream boy band!

Ol’ Prinny’s hiding in Carlton House,

too fat to make the scene!

Let’s swing on past the Royal Horse Guard,

and head for the Serpentine.

O here comes the Janissary,

Janissary, Janissary!

Here comes the Janissary

dream boy band!

Turbans, tunics, quilted pants,

more layers than a tipsy-cake!

Pipe and cymbal, timpani—

Come, give those epaulets a shake!

O here comes the Janissary,

Janissary, Janissary!

Here comes the Janissary

dream boy band!

Cartwheel, back flip,

buck ’n’ wing;

three steps lively,

stop and sing:

To the right—Huh!

To the left—Huh!

Now we’re floating, now we’re flowing;

we’re a river of silk!

Here comes the Janissary,

Janissary, Janissary!

Here comes the Janissary

dream boy band!

Do not think for a moment

that we were boys. Souls

in a like anguish, perhaps;

or when in a fortunate instant

we forgot ourselves—gray mice

biting each others’ tails,

rolling in the grass in our woolen knickers.

We did not understand how to covet.

We knew hatred

because we could smell it

all around us, it sang in the cool glasses

tinkling over our heads,

the carefully tended laughter,

the curious glint

of a widow’s appraisal.

As for competition—ah, well.

Want was a quality I could taste,

music set my body a-roil,

I was nothing if not everything

when the music was in me.

I could be fierce, I could shred

the heads off flowers for breakfast

with my bare teeth, simply because

I deserved such loveliness.

If this was ambition, or hatred,

or envy—then I was all

those things, and so was he.

Two rag dolls set out for tea

in our smart red waistcoats,

we suffered their delight,

we did not fail our parts—

not as boys nor rivals even

but men: broken, then improperly

mended; abandoned

far beyond the province

of the innocent.

[Clement]

Dressed for rejoicing in red jackets,

we climb the sides of the organ

to reach the knobs. I yank out a note,

mix in a fifth, an octave, add eerie flutes

and a buzzing multitude of strings.

George grins, tugging the bass flue

like a helmsman on the Thames.

I prefer the celestes, but reeds are best

for angelic trumpet blasts.

[Bridgetower]

It’s like dancing with thunder,

scrabbling over the groaning deck

of a pitching ark to scale the mast,

Jacob climbing his ladder of light.

No reason for Franz to put on

that somber face. Look at Papa, who is—

how could he help it?—smiling

as we scoot along, poised for his nod

to release God’s glory into the air.

[Haydn]

Understand, all music is physical.

Bassoons rattle bones; a violin tweedles

and like a tooth biting down on a sweet,

pierces the brain. But the organ

climbs into your chest, squeezing

as it shudders—a great lung

hauling its grief through the void

until we can hear how profoundly

the world has failed us.

All men are beggars, white or black;

some worship gold, some peddle brass.

My only house is on my back.

I play my fiddle, I stay on track,

give my peg leg—thankee sire!—a jolly thwack;

all men are beggars, white or black.

And the plink of coin in my gunny sack

is the bittersweet music in a life of lack;

my only house is on my back.

Was a soldier once, led a failed attack

in that greener country for the Union Jack.

All men are beggars, white or black.

Crippled as a crab, sugary as sassafras:

I’m Black Billy Waters, and you can kiss my sweet ass!

My only house weighs on my back.

There he struts, like a Turkish cracker jack!

London queues for any novelty, and that’s a fact.

All men are beggars, white or black.

And to this bright brown upstart, hack

among kings, one piece of advice: don’t unpack.

All the home you’ll own is on your back.

I’ll dance for the price of a mean cognac,

Sing gay songs like a natural-born maniac;

all men are beggars, white or black.

So let’s scrape the catgut clean, stack

the chords three deep! See, I’m no quack—

though my only house is on my back.

All men are beggars, white or black.

It is a sad thing always

to be a slave,

but if slave I must, better

the oboe’s clarion tyranny

than a man’s cruel whims.

I stayed on at Esterháza,

writing music for the world

between spats and budgets,

with no more leave

to step outside the gates

than a prize egg-laying hen.

Even after Miklós died

and his tone-deaf son

filled the courtyard

with military parades,

I hesitated: Call it

robbing Peter to pay Paul,

but I had been homeless once

and did not care for hunger.

I was content. At times, happy:

There were commissions

sufficient to drown out

the Prince’s baryton and

his demand for more

and more divertimenti.

My proudest thought:

that Mozart called me Friend.

My sweetest remembrance:

the black servant’s child

lowering his violin to smile

and whisper (in time to the music!)

“Papa.”

The strangest wages arrived from Spain

in recompense for the Seven Last Words

of Our Redeemer on the Cross

—a giant chocolate cake, spilling gold coins.

But the finest gift I ever received

was the vision of Johann Peter Salomon

with his flamboyant nose and cape

swirling across my doorstep:

“I’ve come to fetch you,” he said.

It was December. We set out

from Vienna on the fifteenth

for London, that great free city.

The cold season passed agreeably.

We had declared the Bridgetower concert to be

our winter party and so were free of social obligations.

Evenings were spent reading, or with music

and friends—the Stowes were frequent guests,

as well as West, President of the Academy,

who would drop by with his eldest son.

Young painter Lawrence, so sorrowfully disappointed

by the Queen’s rejection of his portrait,

availed himself of Mr. Papendiek’s invitation

to drop in for a game of whist whenever he felt

inclined—an inclination indulged with alarming frequency,

although his burnt pencil sketches,

executed during those companionable silences

that fall after spirited conversation and good food,

were much treasured. One evening the Bridgetowers,

father and son, were enjoined to stay for cards and dinner.

Encouraged by their “shared culinary appetites,”

Mr. Papendiek unveiled his favorite fare,

sauerkraut and liver dumplings, which was well received:

The court kitchen at Esterháza would declare war over

such delicacies! exclaimed the elder Bridgetower;

everyone was amused and ate all the more.

Outside, I am not a man.

I am a thing

which in fine company

arouses awe:

that curious fusion of fear and longing

I have learned to make use of.

I am not a country

though I bear the marks

upon this countenance

of my own wretched, fragrant island

and the hopes of its enslavers

in my name: a river crossed, a conquered view.

Still, I am not that sad city. I am more

than its vainglory and collective shame.

Here, on this Isle, I am

a continent. I am so large

they cannot grasp my meaning.

Contours loom, unmapped;

my lineaments refuse coherence.

I am the Dark Interior,

that Other, mysterious and lost;

Dread Destiny, riven with vine and tuber,

satiny prowler slithering up behind

his doomed and clueless prey.

Since in their eyes I have no culture,

I am free to borrow strange adornments:

the Ottoman Sultan’s quilted turban,

a French phrase, Caesar’s cape

flung hyperbolically across Africa’s

gaily layered robes. In this way

I have made from their lust a business.

This is their system; they understand

the service I provide—no trifling pleasure.

And if to them I am no more

than a mere phantasm,

a swarthy figment of their guilt,

yet I came to these shores yoked

to my name: Bridgetower, a reach

and a stretch—and now

I would give up my small empire

to you, my son, but not ever

must you forget that you are, indeed,

a Prince—just not the pitiable one

they worship here, not just the one

they can see.

Guten Tag, Madame,

permit me, s’il vous plaît . . .

Ach, you are too kind!

C’est la musique, you understand,

quel jouissance, quel travail!

And my son, mon petit chou,

mój słodki chłopiec—barely ten,

this bright kernel of a boy,

Wunderkind in allen Aspekten!

Je ne sais pas—ich weiß nicht . . .

sometimes I am betroffen—overwhelmed—

and words fail this flooded heart.

Whereas you, süßes Fräulein,

you are une lumière—excusez-moi,

a discerning light. You see clearly

how wondrous is this music

he makes. Mon Dieu,

um Gotteswillen, Allah’a şükür:

There is such a thing

as beauty that hurts, nicht wahr?

A wound that fascinates,

dolce mordant, that aches

when you smile. Right here,

my angel. Yes there. O ja. Ooo la la. . . .

Get under the sofa and go to sleep.

As if the world could be soothed

by a golden canopy,

the sagging fringe

of a day’s deposits

exerting its ghostly weight.

Go! Go to sleep and—

Sleep? In this room

where your voice roughens

to her tinkling denial,

your scents commingling

(rust and cinnamon, faded rose)

into a shaggy pomander

you would force me

to hang against my heart?

stay out of my way.

No wish easier granted.

I am off, then, to anywhere.

Viotti’s perhaps . . . or closer,

the royal boudoir—

the arabesques and flickering silks

of music, always music!

Only music now

can save me.

I don’t know what to say, how to breathe—not in

all my years at court have I ever borne such a strange

series of events, such impromptu effrontery and rescue.

At the turn of the year, I had decided I would travel into town

for a few days’ visit with my mother and father

as soon as the weather heartened. Finally, the first buds

freshened the roadside; I joined up with the Herschels

and together we boarded the post coach for London—

only to discover the senior Bridgetower already inside.

The Herschels balked, but it would have hardly been Christian

to disembark, so we squeezed ourselves onto a bench

and made the best of the situation. Our African impresario

kept up a merry stream of talk, which I attempted to counterpoint.

Mrs. Herschel was embarrassed and Mr. Herschel too shocked

(and worried as well, I’m sure, about the breach in social ranks)

to utter more than a choked good day; when we pulled up

to the White Horse Cellar, he seized his wife

by the elbow, doffed his hat, and scampered

before the coach had scarcely come to a standstill.

Later that evening I was beset once again by the Moor,

this time lurking in one of the dark passageways

surrounding the Palace. He asked to make

my parents’ acquaintance, and when I protested

that they were too old to receive guests, asked

for a loan to fund, as he put it, “his charge’s purposes.”

I doubt the boy knew anything of the matter

nor would he have need of such charity; nevertheless,

I searched my purse for a guinea and a half

and resolved to forget both matter and money.

But today came the greatest tragedy: This afternoon

the very same braggart appeared at my door

with young George, asking if I would look after him

while he “tended to urgent business” in town!

“Ask” is too much a word; he simply called

the coach to stop, walked the path up to my home,

and deposited the boy.

Once

his father had gone, the poor child

poured out his woes: that he was

forced to squirrel himself away

whenever his father “entertained”—

which entertainment was frequent,

and loud; that he was ashamed of the life

his father led so flagrantly and which

consequently he, as his son, must endure.

I held him to me as he wept;

I must speak to the Court about these events.

There are golden angels, and cockerels

with emeralds for eyes watching everyone

who comes and who goes. A lot of that:

fans snapping shut (swoosh-click)

and tap-tip-tupping of tiny

embroidered shoes

that wouldn’t last a day outside

where London is: dark birds

on the river, speckling the trash heaps.

My father’s an ass

and now he’s gone.

There, I’ve said it.

No one whispers without purpose

here; there’s no love

in their whispers. The Prince paid for me

out of a blue velvet pouch.

Father smirked at my speech.

The Prince has a little round belly.

(No, he doesn’t. No, I didn’t

say it, say anything:

That’s what I’m supposed to answer—

for the Court is vicious, far worse than

a treacherous woman.)

I wonder where I’ll sleep tonight?

First the sash, peacock blue.

Silk unfurling, round and round, until

I’m the India ink dotting a cold British eye.

Now I can bend to peel off my shoes,

try to hook the tasseled tips

into the emerald sails

of my satin pantaloons. Farewell,

Sir Monkey Jacket, monkey-red;

adieu shirt, tart and bright

as the lemons the Prince once

let me touch. Good-bye,

lakeside meadow, good-bye

hummingbird throat—

no more games.

I am to become a proper British

gentleman: cuffed and buckled

with breeches and a fine cravat.

But how? My tossed bed glows,

while I—I am a smudge,

a quenched wick,

a twig shrouded in snow.

Whirligiggery in the key of

Grand Accidental Design:

a clock-and-music-box

inside the head of a woman.

Beneath the gilded turban,

her fat cheeks are lacquered

black; ditto the neck,

swanning sleekly up

from gleaming drapery.

But unique to this

French bit of cabinetry

is the ingenuous manner

she can be prevailed upon

to reveal her mysteries:

Tug the left earring

and the hours pop up

into her eyes; pull on the right

to start the musical engine.

For the modern ear,

however, just one song

remains: a martial ditty

about a widow waiting

for her man, who’s been

shot down or speared through

but in her hopeful affections

lives on, well past Easter

and Trinity, until the loyal valet

returns in black to deliver

his tale of woe

for fifteen or more

murderous verses.

The seven other melodies

are silent—sweetly so.

We let them go; watch

as this boy, standing rapt

at the carpet’s edge

(so as not to muss the fringe),

leans tentatively in to tug

the golden teardrop swinging

from her ear. Inside,

an organ winds its tiny gears,

and the widow’s pink-

tinged sorrow pours

prettily into the palace room.

He shouldn’t be here. (Should he?)

Her eyes can tell him nothing

but the time—the left

in Roman numerals, Arabic

the right; enameled shutters

snap apart ten minutes

to the hour. All the while,

a host of cherubs holds up

her radiant robe, wave garlands,

parade dead game upon a bier—

preoccupy themselves, in short,

with heavenly horseplay.

He gives another yank.

(It’s the only tune he likes.)

Call her what you please—

exotic, incidental,

black as the sun is bright;

tomfoolery, inspired gimcrack,

or just plain thingamabob—

this doo-wop of a timepiece

charms him. What else

can a child do

with such nonsense?

(Adore it. Fear it. Whisper

Father, I’ll miss you forever.)

Polgreen, black Polgreen,

O where have you been?

I’ve been to London

to visit the Queen.

Polgreen, dear Polgreen,

what did you do there?

I played for the Prince

& hid under a chair.

A braised turkey shank, dressed in the paper petticoats of State,

brings water to her red mouth above the ransacked plate.

She lifts her eyes, watching him, amused—

a woman’s grin, neat as a cat’s. He’s gotten used

to banter, but these loins of molten stone—does she know

he aches? Can she see the sheen warming his cheek,

the blush he (thank God) rarely shows?

Ever since the fish course with its delicate, unseemly reek,

he’s tried humming, plotting chords . . . temptation still snakes

a hand into his lap. Who could bear to contemplate

that oozing slice of pheasant pie? Wild for any antidote,

he grabs the port, dribbles its velvet fire down his throat.

Good Lord, her lips—she’s licked them.

Now they’re opening, pink tongue

peeking out, stretching; then on the glistening tip

she slowly positions the snowy tit

of a meringue. Hell, he’ll be hung

for a pound of flesh as well as for a morsel:

I’ll climb your laced stays, milady, rung for rung;

I’ll suck the marrow clean from the rib you stole.

—Frühling, so früh! Ferdinand is amazed

at the onset of spring, so early in the year,

the German gutturals suddenly strange to my ears.

It’s true; Spring has moved in overnight.

The garden paths are all swept yellow.

—Just a little early, I reply, trying for wit

(Frühling, literally, means “early little thing”)

but he doesn’t get it, smiles broadly.

Everything about him is broad—back and

shoulders, barrel chest, embarrassing thighs.

We walk as quickly as his baggage and curiosity allow,

the hem of my morning coat brushing pollen as we move along.

I must be impregnating the length of the Serpentine.

—We call him Lenz. Lenz, for Frühling.

Back home, Spring is a man!

I wince. Bacony blossoms wobbling eagerly

on their freshly furred stalks, musk-scent

steaming up from the lily pads: My London spring reeks.

—Your English is good. Where did you learn it?

An ox; a small, wine-colored ox: That’s my brother.

He came hurtling off the coach, grinning at the sight of me,

then commandeered his traveling chest down from the rack,

freed the violoncello as easily as unlacing a boot.

—You know the old man; he’s obsessed with languages.

How does one forget a brother, blood of my blood

and all that shit? But then, I barely remember our mother,

who hadn’t come with us to Esterházy,

who must have stayed in Dresden to have this little snot . . .

—How is . . . Is he . . . (I could not help it.)

—Gone with a wave of his cape: Poof!

Truth be told, Mutti and I were relieved.

(Give me half a wing, and I’ll shred the air;

a finger bone for a flute, cobwebs for my hair . . .)

What a shame to grow up,

no longer the jigging pig.

Papa Haydn’s back, and all London

is wagging tail—Salomon

leading the charge,

his stupendous nose

open, snuffling. Just

how long does he think

a half note needs to be held?

No fermata demands a lifetime

commitment. Look at that farmer,

sawing away at the poor violoncello

like he’s thrashing rye! Easy, sir . . .

I believe you’ve turned over

turnips a-plenty

for your evening stew.

Another eighth note missed.

If this runaway four-in-hand

would only listen,

they’d feel each crescendo

as a tree feels the spring sap

surging; they’d understand

the conversation they’re supposed

to be having. O torment,

thorn under the nail! Must every violist

in the Royal Society of Musicians

throb so? Legato means

Let-it-go, Papa used to say,

and the music will do its own singing.

I work too slowly for their appetites.

I am a plow horse, not a steed; and though

the plow horse cultivates the very grain that gilds

their substantial guts, they will thrill to any chase,

lay down a tidy fortune and their good name

on the odds of a new upstart darling.

The first trip, I took up Pleyel’s unspoken dare

and promised a new piece every evening

for the length of the concert series.

Intrigue fuels the coldest ambitions;

the daily newspapers thickened

with judgments on the drummed-up duel

between the Maestro and his student of yore.

What was I thinking? I am old enough to value,

now and then, an evening spent with starlight—

not one twittering fan or lacy dewlap obscuring

my sidelong glance—yet I came back

to these noisome vapors, this fog-scalded moon,

fat and smoking, in its lonely dominion.

The black Thames pushes on. I close my eyes

and feel it, a bass string plucked at intervals,

dragging our bilge out to the turgid sea—

a drone that thrums the blood, that agitates

for more and more. . . .

Well, it is done.

I bore down for half a dozen occasions,

wrote a four-part canon to a faithful dog,

wheedled a few graceful tunes

from Salomon’s orchestra, that bloated fraternity

of whines and whistles—and now I can return

to my drowsy Vienna, wreathed in green

and ever turning, turning just slowly enough

to keep the sun soft on her face.

Still waters: If indeed

there were any truth

to the saying, then these

ran deeper than any

he had plumbed or wished

to enter. The deed done

quickly: almost fastidious,

the way she leaned

against the tooled stone

so he could open her,

one silvered cusp of breast

quivering as she exhaled

into the very places his hands

had found to savor.

It wasn’t lust. Something

purer, an appetite sans

soul or mercy, rinsed clean

of the human element

he felt rising in him once more—

sweat pricking, Adam’s apple convulsed

into hoarse arpeggios,

her ragged sighs lapping his ear

as, startled from a cloud,

the humpbacked moon

dumped its rapturous froth

over lawn & balustrade.

Oh. Such a tiny ecstasy for all

that trouble. His heart

pinched in the vast dark

nave of his chest.

Can’t say he walked the walk.

Talked it, but everybody

did that, everybody

had a story to front,

the essential mess of their life.

He was pretty, though. Nobody

messed with the sight of him

because it messed with them

first,

that invisible mirror

shining the truth

straight back. Oh he had it easy

out there

in the world,

promenading

his bright skin and curls,

his agreeably knobbed nose,

eyes black and brown lips

plush enough to sink

a lady’s dreams into

all night. . . .

Nobody told him the truth.

Nobody had a truth worth telling

so they talked all the time,

no secret safe

a week, a day, through Sunday tea—

No one could tell him anything

he really needed:

the idea of something

precious, soothing.

He walked the length of St. James

and kept his hankie in his sleeve;

he willed himself to smell the rot,

powdered wigs and mud and

dying children; he looked and looked

until he met

one keen eye

seeing everything, too:

Old Black Billy Waters,

peg leg and fiddle

just a-going, laughing as if to say

Whatcha gonna do with that stare?

and tossing it

back,

quick as a coin

flipped into

a cup.

Everything I do is a pose: one hand

gripping the balustrade, the other

cupped around a glass of air

lifted into the inked-in sky, a toast to . . .

well, who-knows-and-hell, a drunk’s remorse

is mostly whimsy, anyway—

a strained revelry like this night,

wavering before the advancing forces:

Even the King’s distant shrubbery grows

conspicuous, as ungainly as

a child’s toys left overturned in the parlor.

No birthday for me again this year—

my odd cipher erased by court astronomers

eager to align human measure

to heavenly cadence. An awkward galopp!

But I’ll dance to anything tonight,

off-kilter on my four-year-old legs;

tonight I am lit from within

by that beacon of enlightenment,

French brandy; I sway in homage

to the plumpening lawn and topiary

of your verdant realm, O

mad majesty, my dear glutted Prince!

Again! they cried, rolling in their seats

as we tuned up for the next round: again!

the caroling, plates clattering and flailing limbs:

again! as if the next time

would surely be the best

but not the last . . .

Pinkening sky. And with it

a small breeze

quickening, wisping my cheek,

a ghost’s chill tickle . . .

Foolishness, all of it—

the lost birthdays and prodigal punch,

the extra zeroes on a clean slate—

even the bitch I walked out on

so that I could toast

this sotted stranger, my one true love

laid bare and cold before me: