Elray, as the truest of musicians

Colorful streaks of sound
roll from this room

They say
Praise God, praise life
praise heart.

This is Elray.
She believes in goodness.
You can see it in her eyes.
She loves you.

But it only took one moment to see
Elray, as the truest of musicians.
She sat across from me on her bed with a guitar.
The room was lit by one candle.
She was nervous to play in front of me, but I insisted.

She didn't know I saw.

In the middle of a song, she closed her eyes and felt

one note.

That one note floated away that night
now lost under a mat in a hut somewhere
in Africa, covered in dust.

But she owned that note. It aligned every cell in her body.
It was plucked by her fingers and tuned by her soul.
She was transformed, gone. Whole. I saw it. I witnessed it.

It was unbelievable.

Two years later, I'm teaching myself to play the guitar.
I'll meet many musicians on the way.
But I can always say,

I learned from the best.