"To the Cymbal Player in Mendelssohn’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ Incidental Music Suite" by Aaron Caycedo-Kimura

To the Cymbal Player in Mendelssohn’s
A Midsummer Night’s Dream Incidental Music Suite

black-tied
on the knee
you wait onstage    
           
“Scherzo”  
“March of the Fairies”    
eyes fixed
somewhere in the cellos
I wonder  
the pressure     
           
cymbal in the wrong place
an onstage wreck     
I’ve done it         
ducked behind the brass           
                             
                           
as the “Wedding March” begins
into each other            
So that’s where that’s from   
you get up                                                             
all eyes

hands folded
of your crossed leg
not too far
from the timpanist
“Nocturne”
you sit through it all


if you’re feeling
thinking
Don’t screw up
truly a crash

Tchaikovsky’s Fourth
to avoid the maestro’s glare
thank God
it was just rehearsal
concertgoers lean
whisper

stand behind
your trap table
on you

Aaron Caycedo-Kimura

Aaron Caycedo-Kimura is a writer and visual artist. He is the author of two poetry books: the full-length collection Common Grace (Beacon Press, 2022) and Ubasute, winner of the 2020 Slapering Hol Press Chapbook Competition. His honors include a MacDowell Fellowship, a Robert Pinsky Global Fellowship in Poetry, a St. Botolph Club Foundation Emerging Artist Award in Literature, and nominations for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, and Best New Poets anthologies. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Beloit Poetry Journal, Plume Poetry, Poetry Daily, RHINO, Pirene’s Fountain, Salamander, Cave Wall, Shenandoah, and elsewhere. Aaron earned his MFA in creative writing from Boston University and is also the author and illustrator of Text, Don’t Call: An Illustrated Guide to the Introverted Life (TarcherPerigee, 2017).

Headshot: Luisa Caycedo-Kimura

Photo Credit: Staff