The purest note pierces the grubbiest corner
of the Hauptbahnhof shopping concourse.
Something in the heart of the escalator
has caught,
a moving shudder, a feeling gasp,
and a piccolo burst of postmodern birdsong
slides breathy-rosined through the air
at sensitive intervals.
A masterful dissonance
falls like water from icicles
and we stand quietly, carried at measured speed
through this art installation,
our ears barely able to take it all in.
Beneath our feet the metal
ascends in darkness,
relives its birth over and over.