<![CDATA[STEPHEN BACHICHA - Close Your Eyes Info]]>

Close Your Eyes was commissioned by Mezzo-Soprano, Susanne Mentzer as part of her Standing Still: Still Standing, Thoughts from a Pandemic Isolation Set to Music project. The poems are taken from a collection of poems written by Reg Huston during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. The three poems I selected were put together to create a monodrama for the singer. The scene is that of a dying elderly person and a younger loved one sitting together. We enter in the middle of their conversation. In the first song, the singer is an elderly person, telling of hardships she witnessed and remembers in her past. In the second song, the singer switches roles and is in her head, barely listening while the old person is talking. She imagines being the old person, lying there, and what must go through their mind, until she realizes she IS that elderly person, reliving her memories until abruptly it stops, and she realizes where she is. In the third song, the singer takes the role of the spirit of the elderly person’s partner who has passed on. The spirit guides and tells the elderly person that everything is ok, to let go and find peace.

I. My Senses, My Sense Is, August 3, 2020

I became deaf long ago
but I can still hear the cries of anguish
and the shrieks of horror of the oppressed
every day
every night.

When I had no more taste for the cruelty
beaten into the backs and skulls of the innocent,
I still winced at the bitterness
because, in the light of day,
I could feel the pain of the plight of the thousands

And, I cried,
for in the darkness,
I could see the writing on the wall.

III. Come With Me, August 10, 2020

Close your eyes, dear,
you can see me
floating gently
in the breeze.
I will drift by
as you’re sleeping,
come with me, sweet,
love of mine.
Do not tarry,
do not worry,
I am here for
you, my dear.
We will fly up
to the heavens,
you will rest
and have no fear.

Trust your vision,
you’re not dreaming,
you’ve awakened
to your love,
We are joined now
here in heaven,
rest eternal in my love.

II. One Tangible Tear, January 26, 2021

one drop of rain on a window pane;

a descending streak of opaque vision.
a tear on the cheek of an old person
is the same; no less, no more.

the elderly don’t cry out loud,
they don’t sob.
they internalize,
silently,
privately,
with one tangible tear,
only one tangible tear.

they stare off into the distance,
while looking at my past
through cataracts.

come visit me.
is it time for my meal?
is it time for my medicine?

is it my... time?

my hand in my lap
keeping time
to a song in my head.

i was wondering about the...
oh, i forget.
where was i?
where am i?

Listen. There. There!
The music is playing.
I remember that tune! I remember our song!
We danced along.
I remember the night I first spent with you.
I remember.
I remember THAT, I do.
the music stopped.
where was I?
staring off in the distance while looking back.