Please Play

Please Play

(“Let us look for someone who can play the harp. When the black mood from God moves in, he’ll play his music and you’ll feel better.” 1 Samuel 16:16)

Please won’t you play another song from your memory,
a song that grew from candle rooms to coffee houses,
the lilt that learned the notes (by note) without rote repetition,
the decoration like the fragrance at the highest tip of nouveau perfume.

Please slide the bow across the strings, let them sing like homesickness,
please begin with the melodies we both know from childhood,
the words that stir within us, the comfortable stew we always knew
we would remember.

Mouth the words as you play the tune, a cadence for kings with
faraway eyes.

Please sing the passion that drove us to smile,
please renew the reels, jigs and blues,
pick a shanty of ships at sea,
improvise it handily, help my heart repeat with you
the stories from work and companions who never penned
a word or note.

I will not play this time, nor attempt to follow the designs,
the rhymes fool me, the changes escape me,
but your virtuosity schools me, your phrases reshape me,
and I would lie upon my wooden floor, back and head
unpillowed,

and stare at nothing but the memory that a single afternoon
may still my stormy imaginations. I would travel a day
and another, and return just the same,
to hear you play only for me once again.