Deborah Warren

THE COUPLE WHO COULD NOT MAKE SMALL TALK

Nothing touching a harpsichord is coarse.
This man built them—he bred them, more, as though
living things—and he trained the keys to go,
rippling the same way muscles play a horse.
Not a worker or warhorse: Dainty wars,
painted, gilt, by his wife in a tableau,
turned each lid to a tilt seen by Watteau
at fêtes champêtres, or Fragonard's amours.

God had limned her thick, giving her the grace
granite has, and her husband hardly spoke.
When he did speak, he stammered, and it was
work for him just to look us in the face.
Either one, with the play of finger-stroke,
said such words as gentled the world for us.

Top of Page

Poetry

Fiction

Essays

Reviews

~~~