Analogue - by Stephen Edgar
ISLAND | ISSUE 156Prising apart that tight-packed concertina
Of LPs stowed away
And half-forgotten on the floor,
I flip through and pick one, by Palestrina,
And place it on the turntable to play.
The stylus sinks into the groove. Out pour
Those voices memory
At last is prompted to requite
With air time after twenty years or more.
And with a jolt, as when you turn and see
Some common object in a different light,
It seems miraculous
That music should lie here, deferred
On a dead plate of vinyl, in that tight,
Etched groove encoded round the radius,
A dormant, auditory ghost, unheard
But waiting to resume
From limbo in my haunted ears
This polyphonic presence, every word
And note called up to repossess the room.
So too, after the lapse of several years,
You’ll take old photos out.
Under the stylus of your gaze,
A flat and long dead countenance that peers
Through time, with smile, blank stare, or knowing pout,
Will cause your throat to catch, as it replays
Scenes that materialise
Before you, acts that still persist:
The inimitable tone, the favourite phrase,
The very scent, the presence in the eyes,
The hand outstretched and brushing on your wrist. ▼
This poem appeared in Island 156 in 2019. Order a print issue here.
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