turning off, tuning in

as a lover of music
the car stereo is always on &
when the stereo isn’t on,
the ipod/iphone is in &
when the ipod/iphone isn’t in
*such rare & unfortunate circumstances,
the mind itself, in connection with the heart,
sings a thousand tunes or so---
sometimes layering inside the whole of the body
with wonderful melodies & beats,
there is simply no way to keep from distraction in the
moment.

one evening while on the road alone
hovering above the asphalt as we do
in our gas guzzling monstrosities, lingering like a fart
let out in the 20th century,
he decided to turn off the stereo &
without having plugged his ears in either,
he listened to a sound that he never heard before---
in fact, it was the absence of these imposed sounds which inhabited a sound
all of their own,
where the silence of the night, compounded with the engine’s own murmur,
with the wind outside pelting itself against the car,
all came into play
filling him with a sense of awareness,
which up to that moment
he couldn’t place having had as of yet.