Ralph Block

LIKE rain, that silvers out of a silent sky—

“So hard,” you said.

And I sent back my heart in a vain try

To hold below your voice

Some remnant memory of strange songs he played.

(These moments never quite return—

Not through all the years I’ll count and spend,

Or light tapers to old gods and watch them burn.)

“Like granite feet”—

You laughed, and then came back,

“Both light and strong,

A tracery of rock on rock.”

The moment opened wide and let me in.

I looked behind

As a man who plays with sin,

Knowing what it was I sought—

The “variation” he could never play,

That from his fingered keys would always stray

Uncaught.

“You seemed held deep

In thought”

I lied to that—confession’s cheap,

A lie’s a compliment—

And found myself wondering where to heap

New devotions that would keep

Your eyes in mine

In this strange experiment.

We were in a net

Of other people’s words:

They crossed us there like swords.

At last I tipped my hat

And felt your tension drop—

Hearts stop perhaps

Like that

No doubt you will forget

The evening when we remet:

For you a door had edged and closed

Upon a stranger awkwardly disposed

When I went out.

For me the days will live it through each time

In a kind of troubled rhyme—

When concert whispers rise and fall,

And other Russian preludes run

Up chromatic scales and down.

Repelled by chatter, and in vain,

I’ll watch the faces for a sign;

As when I held out hands and cried,

And of all the souls that faced my way

Only yours replied.

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