We had weather here this week that was fierce by the standards of the Santa Barbara coast. It put me in mind of this poem, which I decided to post.
There are two audio options for the reading. The first is with music fore and aft by JS Bach (Ah, Bach), at about one minute, twenty seconds.
The second without music, just me, at 46 seconds.
I would very much appreciate knowing which you think is preferable. If music (public domain source, by the way) doesn’t add value to the presentation, I’ll stop doing it.
Between Storms
Sad, how the clouds gather again
against the small hills
for reasons I cannot comprehend,
and how I stand here watching
the last boat carrying men
from oil rigs in the cast iron sea.
Sad, how all the gulls are home
asleep, having eaten all day,
how I see the shadow of the clock
on the water, its hands turning
from island to harbor
to the tender sand beneath my feet.
So sad, how finally I am rising up,
falling in a long arc
into the mountains of darkness.
Between Storms by Kyle Kimberlin
is licensed: Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
Metaphor 
Thank you both for your comments! I’m going to try to learn more about merging audio tracks and see where that goes. 15 seconds seems long for a lead-in. By the way, I’m subscribed to both of your blogs in Reader, and enjoying your posts!
Oh, Kyle, this is perfectly beautiful. Well done. As for the music, who doesn’t love Bach (or a M.A.S.H. reference)? But I think I prefer just your voice. Perhaps if you could blend it into the vocal part? But I see no problem with keeping it either really. It does sound very NPR, and that’s not a bad thing.
Beautifully atmospheric 🙂