In the land of high hills and vast plains, in a place where we believe only what we see, there live the few forgotten People of Music.
The People of Music eat notes for breakfast. They think in music, they dream in music and stay close to the songs of the earth. They breathe the songs of our hearts and feel the heartbeats of our drums.
When I hear the beat of the drum, I see it pass through the drummer’s body. I see the song transform itself from thought to rhythm and I see it run down their arms and through the drumstick until it echoes loudly in my ears. How, I wondered? How do they hear it?
I saw her on the grass one afternoon, her mind caught in the middle of a song, I was sure. her arms were swimming through the sun, her body was rocking to a tune I could not hear. and she was smiling, like she knew a secret I did not understand.
Alex is mute. She has the pleasure of sound but not the ability of speech. I begin tapping to the beat of her arms on the side of the wall. Alex turns around and giggles wildly with delight. She comes closer, closer to the beat, and corrects me. she shows me the beat. We play in the grass under the hot sun for hours. She never misses a beat. Alex lies down on the ground. This child of seven years brings my ears close to the grass. “Can you hear it?” her eyes ask me.
“What am I listening for?” I ask. “Shhhh.” she smiles back and retreats her face back to the tall blades and cool earth. And I listen. I hear birds, I hear the air push past me in slow motion. I try harder. What am I trying to hear? I push my ears further. I hear flies buzz past my nose, I hear the low roar of a distant lawn mower. And for an instant I think I hear what she hears. She hears the song.
I come back the next day and the next. when I see her, she is drumming from room to room. her songs are on the walls, on the tables, on the chairs. Her songs are the empty boxes waiting to be played.
I am confused. One day I go to see the women – one young, one old, and tell them what I have heard. I look up to see them smiling.
“This girl must have a drum.” is what they tell me, and reach for one on the wall. “Take this to her. It belongs to her. When you are ready, come back for yours.”
Alex calls me Drum. She does not say it, she merely drums when I come to see her. How do I tell her she is the Drum? Now Alex has her drum, and the air and the sounds of that afternoon come to find her. They always did. And I always listen hard, to hear her song.
Alex Kilbourn-Gourley is now 9 years old. Alex has been living with Cerebral Palsey all of her 9 years. Play her a song. Any song. She knows what it is. And she’ll play you hers…