"not much in his hat" - He puts the big notes away so no one can pinch them!
Andrew
On 22/08/07, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Last Night in Lygon Street
>
>
> Hear that fiddle, quavery
> but singing a familiar tune?
> Greensleevesš - so evergreen.
>
> To its wordless melody
> phrases float up from
> my imperfect memory.
>
> Shešs jilted him, hešs lilting on
> the other words, Išve never quite
> got them sorted out.
>
> Keening through the dusk
> above the traffic noise, itšs
> some busking violinist
>
> under the Lygon Street
> curving tin verandas
> by the flower stall look,
>
> isnšt the fiddler man
> familiar too?
> old colleague, McCann
>
> (philosophy, retired),
> still with the sad face
> and the gaberdine mac.
>
> Pension (I might ask)
> not enough? Neitheršs
> mine I ought to busk
>
> myself, but lack the tools,
> the nerve, the skills.
> And therešs not much in his hat -
>
> how much could he earn?
> Honestly, this smallish coin
> is all I can spare him.
>
> I sidle past unrecognised.
> Could it be moneyšs not
> what hešs after, but to test
>
> some theory once sketched
> in ethics class, when someone
> objected: 'In the real world...'?
>
> Or in aesthetics,
> what if the less-skilled version
> moves one more than the most?
>
> Wednesday 22 August 2007
> Max Richards
> Doncaster, Victoria
>
--
Andrew
http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
http://www.inblogs.net/hispirits
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