For Jono
Under the shade of the wide-leafed Maple,
turning your waffle cone to catch
the rivulets of Rocky Road, you casually
mention that when you were homeless
you played a piano in an abandoned house.
How the light left long shadows, how the temperature
dropped in your skin, how you scrabbled long enough
the house whispered to you, like the fox underneath
the backyard brambles when you were twelve,
before your episodes began and your parents went quiet.
Windows crusted with icy condensation,
walls fended off sleet and anxiety,
the scritch of a skunk perhaps, under
the floorboards, the smell of emptiness.
A Baldwin souring in the corner of the living room.
Days of boredom, yet half-warmth. Nights
dreaming your hands were amputated.
One soft hour, the light broke across the keys and
you played your radiant music so long
and so loud, you stitched notes to the sky.
Published in Pink Panther Magazine