i sat down to write of arnold as a literary modernist. of america as the bastard child of modernism and post-modernism, only it's the child that never claims its parents. seeking objectivity through the understanding of individual and cultural subjectivity, without ever really committing to anything as more than a thought. never real. never truth.
never truth.

and that's where i lose the thread of my thought. in the background miles has been playing tirelessly for the last 30 minutes, almost like he's searching for something. feeling his way through the music. it was enough that he was there with me, and i could leave him in the background, underlying my thoughts, without paying much attention to him. but now i can hear that he's found it, found the one note on his trumpet that holds everything that's ever been known in the world, and the rest of the band has stopped what it's doing to listen, with me in step behind them. he holds the note, letting its truth and sadness seep into the surrounding silence. you can hear the weight of it all, rushing in on him. falling in on him.
the note wavers.
trips into minor.
wavers more still.
fading.
fading.
(silent)


and now i'm sitting there with him. in the dim haze of the club. smoking my cigarette.
hoping not to hear another sound for the rest of the night.