In Sad Hotels

Instrumentation: Voice, Piano

Music transposed to suit any vocal range. Please specify low and high pitches
Range for the piece: one octave plus a Major 3rd.

Year Composed: 2005
Duration: 3 minutes, 30 seconds
Text by: Olga Cabral (text is in English)
Pages: 9

How to get it: Contact me directly

In Sad Hotels

Olga Cabral

In sad hotels there are no assignations
only time looking at his watch
and pensioners sitting day after day
in the dark plush chairs.
The mirrors are all clouded over.
The uniforms have been gnawed by mice.
The bellhop is a junkie. The gilt cage elevator
is a retired opera diva
unpredictable in its trills and runs.
Antimacassars float on the ceilings.
Hair wreaths are hung on peeling memories.
Tiny women in wrinkles and faded hats
fold their gloved hands and wait
for the communication of a cough or a sigh,
their en tire conversation for the day.
Slumped in their chairs, men old and solitary
stare at the boring rerun of their lives.
The passer by outside in the sunlight
quickens his step, shaken by a scene
in purgatory: the twilight of sad hotels
and faces the color of crumpled moths.

In Sad Hotels is reprinted with the kind permission of the estate of Olga Cabral.
From the book “Tape Found in a Bottle” 1971, Olivant Press