Jennifer L. Freed
Practising Für Elise

‘…(W)ritten in 1810, Beethoven had recently been involved in a courtship with
Therese Malfatti, who eventually turned down Beethoven’s marriage proposal.
This could account for some of the effusive and overwhelming emotion of the music.’
–Duane Shinn, Beethoven’s Mysterious Inspiration

He is dead, and she is dead, but still
there are the notes
he wrote for her,
and you,
in your late life,
are learning:
your hands at last have found the rhythm
of his hands,
and his life moves
the very air you breathe.