Small Plums and Mahler's Fifth
a poem by Jane Hirschfield
It’s true that I am a sucker for a poem that references a composer or a brass instrument, but that’s just a small part of why this poem endures as one of my favorites—bees seducing a plum’s unaware blossom, the hard stare shared between two young musicians while the audience does not notice; the phrases ‘timpanic clamor
