Old Player Piano

3. Old Player Piano
Dedication to playing music; nostalgia and beyond

Old Player Piano come take me away
From whatever I thought so important today.
For eighteen long years I have left you neglected,
Except for some treasures on top I’ve collected:
Pink shells from the Gulf, a framed tide pool serene,
Two bulldogs, my junior high Little League team.
I’ll sit by this shrine,
Let your vibrations guide me:
To play you again, is my dream.

Pictures come take me back out to the lake
Where the evening sun gilds the beach stairs with grace.
Of family out picking cabbage and corn:
Some are still with us, and some have passed on.
But the light that they loved still streams through the trees there,
O’er the vines, up the ridge, toward the clouds and the clear.
Pictures keep beaming
Above my piano
Remind me my loved ones are near.

Old broken metronome brought from my father’s home,
Presto is now the lone tempo you know.
Take me back to the time that you kept time so slow,
Kept me practicin’ when I just wanted to grow up
And follow my brother to the world he had known,
Play guitar, steal a kiss, find a love of my own.
Mahogany metronome,
Keeping time slow
Told me then what I now yearn to know.

Piano I pray thee now: do as you will
With this errant old singer who sits by you still.
Let your chords tie into love locked inside of me:
Songs that can comfort, inspire, and thrill.
You’re part of a dream that just won’t fade away,
And I felt ‘til just now I had no more to say.
So my fingers alight
As your keys black and white
Turn me open, and play me tonight.