Illuminate the Cadence

from "The Dead" by James Joyce

The voice, made plaintive by distance and by the singer's hoarseness, faintly illuminated the cadence of the air with words expressing grief.

This lovely Joyce passage is a synesthetic description of singing. "Illuminated" would suggest visual clarification, not audial. Then, "cadence" shows up, which is a musical term meaning "rhythm" that seems to disagree with "the air," unless we take the musical definition of "air," which is a synonym for "tune."

The jumble of terms and meanings echoes the skipped heartbeat that occurs when we hear great music.

Thanks to Arthur Phillips for wrestling with this sentence before me.