Logan Miller is a junior interdisciplinary major studying journalism, writing and business.
—-YYZ
was
the first song I
taught myself when I
learned to
play
guitar back in
middle school, while kids
watched the
riff
I was playing
containing a key
only
Rush
could have known. To
Toronto every
note pulled
me
with the rhythm
pulsating in Morse
code. My
hand
would fret notes in
asymmetrical
tempo.
Rush
still plays it; I
do too sometimes when
I feel
My
fingers trying
to take me to the
airport,
tag
my bags, and fly
to Toronto, Y
Y Z
—–
I started playing guitar when I was twelve. Back then, I really loved listening to a Canadian progressive rock band, Rush. YYZ was the first song I taught myself on guitar (YouTube it!). The intro starts out with a very distinct rhythm pattern, which I incorporated as the meter of my poem. What I wouldn’t learn until years after I taught myself the song was that the rhythm at the beginning is actually Morse code for “YYZ.” YYZ is the airport tag-code for Toronto, Canada.
Knowing how to play (most) of the song made me feel like a master guitarist when I was in middle school. The riff after the Morse code intro made my fingers feel like they were moving faster than I could think, and I wanted to combine that feeling of making my fingers fly with the concept of the airport tag code–all while maintaining the concealed rhythm used in the intro of the song.
