Playing His Heart Out
By
Ken Smith
That day we were trapped
between chartreuse living
room walls and the godly
cleanliness of afghans
saving sofas and chairs.
We were talking about
anything except Uncle Carl—
gone, how we'd miss him—
when Uncle Gus came down
the hall and stood in
the archway, his wiry
body strapped under a black
accordion. "Haven't played,"
he said, "for a long time."
So he played a waltz and I
squirmed in my chair under
the slow flow of grief. He
played a polka and I heard
my sister clapping lightly
for the mourner bending over
the keys. His cheek-bones,
red as Helgoland's
cliffs on the North Sea. Gulls
whirled and screamed around
the black load on his heart.
between chartreuse living
room walls and the godly
cleanliness of afghans
saving sofas and chairs.
We were talking about
anything except Uncle Carl—
gone, how we'd miss him—
when Uncle Gus came down
the hall and stood in
the archway, his wiry
body strapped under a black
accordion. "Haven't played,"
he said, "for a long time."
So he played a waltz and I
squirmed in my chair under
the slow flow of grief. He
played a polka and I heard
my sister clapping lightly
for the mourner bending over
the keys. His cheek-bones,
red as Helgoland's
cliffs on the North Sea. Gulls
whirled and screamed around
the black load on his heart.
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Disclaimer
We do not accept unsolicited submissions. American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2015 by Sharon Chmielarz , “Playing His Heart Out,” from Visibility: Ten Miles, (North Star Press of St. Cloud, Inc., 2015). Poem reprinted by permission of Sharon Chmielarz and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2024 by The Poetry Foundation.