The music plays.
Sweeping down the corridors of the empty hall.
Flying by the paintings on the walls.
Soothing the cracked frames.
Moisturizing the dry paint.
Furnishing the narrow space with ribbon and jewels.
Dusting off all tables and vacant chairs.
The music plays on.
To the king’s room.
The king grows mad at the disturbance of his peace.
He leaps into the hallway,
Astounded by the fanciness of the new things.
He follows the voice up the corridor to an empty chamber.
There a dove flies past.
Along with a note it dropped in front of him.
Dumbfounded, he opens the piece of folded paper.
“Here are new, fine linens and valuables that you may keep.
Only as long as I remain fresh in your memory.
A tree is growing in the chamber below you, go to it.”
The king rushes down to the floor beneath.
Finds the small tree in the cracked ground.
He picks off an apple from the tree and takes a bite.
In a moment the king’s crown lay on the ground.
The serpent slithers out of the cracked floor, laughs
And ventures back to the fields.
You have lost again, Adam.