Home		Irene McKinney Ravi Sings
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		The water-glug sounds of the tabla; the dark dervish, the white cotton. Past the glistening windows, one by one by one; he opens his throat all the way and calls for God, longing and reconciliation seared together, the great cry rising up out of the open throat; O the deepest nerve pressed upon; O the clitoral pain, moving falsetto up by stages over the drone of the hum of the world and the planets, the moon, the plane of the ghosts and the demons, pulling harder against the gravity of this life; the voice a great book full of knowing that longing goes on and on; a gagging, a shaking of the glottal, a shadow-voice beside it, healing as it burns the open throat, the esraj crying in its strings, the ululation straining up from the drone. I stare into the turning tape and the sweet powerful shadows come into my ear; that someone could cry for God in such a way; that I could cry with him. Seethala Lakshmi. Six and three-fourths beats.
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