Going Through the Boxes

I've spent the last few days going through some old papers. For months now the papers in the closet--a stack of old sketches and scores, memorabilia, letters, etc.--threatened to overwhelm. So I've started the paging through, and am shocked at a few things I find. For one, I find pieces I don't remember writing, or just barely remember: a flute concerto called New York Panels (unfinished, but not by much), about six songs (settings of, of all things, Shel Silverstein), a few piano pieces, the start of two different operas, a prelude for chamber orchestra, an organ piece, and a huge setting (illegal; unfinished) of T.S. Eliot's "Rhapsody on a Windy Night" (this one rattled around in my head for years). I wonder what to do with these things: save them? Burn them? Cast them into the river? Bank them for ideas?

It is remarkable, for someone who feels so un-prolific, to see these towering stacks. So many hours, so much pain and sacrifice, so many tears and false starts. The sum total of my life--the last twist of the knife (?)

For now, I just enjoy the non memories.