Banging on that Old Piano

Banging on that Old Piano

He never whines.  He just gets angry sometimes.  Sometimes he just sits to sip wine.  He never opines.  Sometimes he goes out to dine though he seems to never eat.  Often he just sits and taps his feet.  Finally when he explodes à la mode he gets to banging on that old piano that y'all recall is down the hall.

Angry are the keys.  Hot is the summer night's breeze.  There seems to be nothing else that will set him at ease.  He has a heart that's hard to please.  That's because it's been so marred and so deeply scarred.  Life for him has been treacherous and hard but he does not strain to complain.  Often he just takes walks in the rain.  He's probably the only one that isn't insane.

Odd jobs on even days often put nothing in his pockets but an odd wrench or maybe even a rusty  socket.  Sometimes he dreams of riding a rocket and he doesn't want to know where it's going to go.  Just as long as it's away from the strife of life.  The other day someone tried to stab him with a knife.  Without it being suggested he was the one that was arrested.  Without bail he sat in jail and when he got out he didn't rant, chant or shout!  It's his way not to have much to say.

Some say he's just guilty of being filthy.  Actually on its face this is not the case.  His clothes are just torn from being worn.  He doesn't dress to impress.  The piano is his empress.  In a blur he spends his money on her.  It's to keep her tuned.  It's to keep her clean.  It's to keep her glistening so that we keep right on listening.  Sometimes he just bangs away.  He seems to get the tunes just right in the middle of the night, particularly when he's just been in a fight.  You can tell that he plays with all of his might and you can bet that he puts up a sweat.  It's a wonder that he hasn't been discovered yet.

One day he played all day.  It was as though things were perfectly okay!  He was even gleaned to have been clean and word was heard that he could sing.  Never was this often and mostly he remained in his coffin.  Mostly he was a furnace in which burned an urn.  Slow did he grow to glow and more than slightly did he shine brightly.  Never was he a mellow fellow.  Often he seemed to walk in a deep dark meadow and that's when he would get to banging on that old piano that y'all recall is down the hall.

Orrin K. Loftin, Explorer

Copyright?  When in a hot summer breeze you could hear him banging on these keys.

October 25^th, 2013