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The Upright Piano
           After Piano on Fire by Andrew Ferez

I see myself out in the cold, draped in a silk nightgown, seated
barefoot on a stool by that upright piano, you know, the one my
mother bought when she thought I should take piano lessons, while
others played during recess, oh, how I first struggled striking notes
daily, practicing scales, then rehearsing Mozart’s “Rondo alla Turca”
till I’d play it in my mind relentlessly, tan tan tan . . . tan tan tan . . .
even when I knew I’d never learn another piece, and now, half a
century later, I am drawing with memory’s wavering lines that same
piano to make it the vessel of my heart’s message, of so much left
unsaid buried in a bitter well turning into notes that rise in tongues of
cold fire licking my insides with every key I touch, unharmed, I feel
the piano ablaze under my fingertips, twisted candles adorn its top
that grows into a tower and turrets spouting flames from windows,
a menace to the adjacent branches, my fingers wildly strike the
keyboard while the sky opens up like a stage filled with shimmering
damask memories dancing to the melody like maddened fireflies.