Dreaming Mendelssohn
By Margie Dimoplon
I woke up Christmas morning hearing Mendelssohn,
the music from my dream continuing a theme
so joyful and light-as-air it lingered – celestial.
My mind searched lines and spaces to identify
the composition’s name and movement:
Sonata No. 1 in F Minor, allegro assai vivace.
But why Mendelssohn on Christmas?
Why not Bach or Handel who put on paper
those streams of sound: the Messiah become music?
And then – remembering what remains an Abrahamic family
conversation, and music’s power to move, divisions ease,
and dissonances cease – I knew,
and never did I cherish more the great good heart
of reconciliation, the one, foretold, whose birth of beauty old
we know, twice told, by Gentile, Luke and Jew, Matthew.
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Note: Composer Felix Mendelssohn, grandson of 18th Century German Jewish philosopher and spiritual leader, Moses Mendelssohn, noted for his writings on aesthetics.
The author, Margie Dimoplon taught Creative Writing at Ball State University for many years, where she guided and mentored young writers. Her work has appeared in national magazines and she has won awards for her poetry and short stories. She lived for a short time in Chatham, New Jersey, where she crossed paths with my Mom and they have shared a 30+ year correspondence. This message was in Margie’s Christmas Card in 2017.