The Violin, all good musicians say, No ear had I, or skill; but Discipline
While yet in babyhood you must begin;
And so, beneath my little rounded chin,
’Twas promptly tucked, and I began to play
The Violin.
Recked not of that; and so I sawed away,
And rent the air with Purgatorial din;
Pondering the while, profoundly, day by day,
Of dark recesses, secret nooks, wherein
I might (with Providential aid) mislay
The Violin
"E, laser of the ear, ear's
vinegar, bagpipes
in a tux, the sky's blue, pointed;
A, youngest of the four, cocksure
and vulnerable, the white kid
on the basketball team — immature,
ambitious, charming,
indispensable; apprenticed
to desire;
D is the tailor
who sewed the note "I shall always love you"
into the hem of the village belle's wedding dress,
a note not discovered until ten years later in New York
where, poor and abandoned, she was ripping up the skirt
for curtains, and he came,
and he married her;
G, cathedral of the breastbone,
oak-light, earth;
..."
