I hear the variations before they are played,

Before the descending phrase of the first aria

Tumbles down the ether,

A statement establishing the theme

With notes meaningless one without the other,

Yet pregnant when set in motion together.

You do not have to play it now.

I hear it in anticipation.

Understand, it is not hollow memory

Floating up from the past.

No, I hear it now, this very moment

In all its solidity.

I do not count the leaves on the tree

To see it as a tree.

Even if I turn my back

It is there. I see it.

So it is with the thirty arias

Fast and slow, simple and complex.

I heard it once so it lives forever.

I hear it before your fingers touch the keys.

I sense the silence before the reprise ends,

The final departure, the last return.

I hear the quiet before the ether empties.

In the interregnum, I sleep like Count Kaiserling.