A Lumberjack Turned Piano Man

still
he saws
at the legs of his Steinway

old habits only die hard

so he tickles the ivory
cigarette
hanging from his lips

sounds of falling trees
echo in his bedroom

forests he chopped down
to find his way here

upon their bones he paints his notes

thinks of branches that fell
as he tore through their guts

calloused his fingers
and
he was left
with just splinters and dreams

now
in solitude
he writes his song

maybe someday he'll play it for us
but
unlikely

never convinced that it's finished

never certain that it is genuine

never certain that he can bare the audience

if they say
nothing
it will exasperate him

if they applaud
it will
remind him
that
they still don't understand

blood
drips rhythmically from his hands

melodies of mourning

so they remain
hidden

as the trees remain
fallen

he might
never
share his work

but
that he holds it back
to some
might be
its own music

every note picks its moment
but
every bridge becomes a stand-still

"should i cross here?"
he asks himself
"or would I be wisest to go around?"

he knows the wood
the beams are made of
and questions their strength

"if they were so easy to chop down
why should i trust in them to hold up?"

but
if
it was that hard to get here
"why should I turn back?"

but he finds
no answer

perhaps
silence
is to be his opus

every pause
a bow of the cello

every drink
a beat of the drum

he has buried himself
with a wall
and the tempo
in which
he attempts to claw himself out
is off time with the other instruments

he sighs
over the remnants of harmonies
cutting himself
with a shank carved from crescendos

only a dirge can be his fate

a lumberjack turned piano man
and wrote a song that falls in the forest