~
In the late 1960’s
when my mother was in high school choir
a ghost sang with them sometimes in the rehearsal room
if all the basses, tenors, and sopranos joined on que
and their tone and pitch were perfect
a mysterious songbird arrived
to harmonize with them near the ceiling
octaves above their own voices.
Mr. Dougherty, the instructor, would whoop and holler
inviting their songbird, Alice, to sing louder…
and without flaw when a tone
reverberates in each of us
a ghostly phenomenon of the normal variety rises to the ceiling
to sing inside and with us all and as a species.
In those moments our collective voices join in harmonious chorus
we become one with each other and invite the natural world
to come, and sing along. /