3.14.2018

Happy Pi Day!

I had read Leonardo DaVinci believed music and math were closely related, that music, like math, could be calculated. While celebrating Pi Day, read Birds On A Wire to learn the musical message the birds communicated to Mr. DaVinci. 

Bir♪s on a Wire

Blackbirds
Not two or three
He will spy,
But a flock
 
Wire perched
Not on one or two
But on the five that
Span the block
 
On five wires staggered
Random in appearance
That is. to untrained eyes
But his were trained, and
By coincidental circumstance
It was in fact his eyes
They had caught in glance
And thus recognized
Their musical stance
 
Most anyone else
Most normal folk
Would not even
Have taken note
But he was not most anyone else
He was not your normal bloke
He was a noted genius
And he had taken note
 
For it was he who believed
In the mathematics of music
It is not that I may not believe that too
But I can’t read music
So my ears are lost to
The song the notes sing
Is that a treble clef … a half note?
Sing it, don’t show it
If it’s a tune, I wouldn’t know it
 
But it was he who perceived it in his soul
Over the beat of the heart that drives life itself
He heard the song
Manifested in the architecture of
The lines lined with birds
Blackbirds from above
 
So what is it silently stirs the wind to blow
This song they sing—sung voiceless, though
This message they bring through musical notes
Formed by positions of wings on a staff that floats
 
On a scroll of his own
He makes note of the notes
He translates into his own cipher
Another castle with its own moat
But it ends, drawbridge open
With their message, and I quote
From the lyrics to the song
From the notes that they wrote
 
“Knock three times”
“To the point of no return”
“One is the loneliest number”
“And four to go”
Does it all add up?
The genius responds with a sigh
No, but what do you expect
They’re just a flock of Mag-π-s
Serving up a slice
Of blackbird π