While I am drunk, I float because my foot feels soft. One day, I floated into a building on the top of a hill. It has the aura of a golden palace - it is here that people learn the making of music and art. As I tiptoed along its hallways from door to door, I first heard a young maiden, perhaps talking to herself, on a violin, and then a tenor, a man singing alone at late night when everything else falls asleep. From the basement, however, came the devastating sound of a drum, incessant, overwhelming the violin, the tenor..., hollowing my heart while my eyes saw a great number of contenders on a brutal battlefield. How could abstract notes convey things so real? It seemed like a virtual tour of the human condition. I also saw tiny dim practice rooms with organs in them. Before, I had seen glorious performances only in the concert hall, and always loved the elegant glow of musical instruments on the stage, but didn't know the making of art actually happened in such squeezed places. Maybe the glory of art is all about "squeeze" - squeezing pearls out of squeezed human existence.

 

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