Piano

 ~ DH Lawrence

SOFTLY, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me;

Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see

A child sitting under the piano, in the boom of the tingling strings

And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she sings.

In spite of myself, the insidious mastery of song      

Betrays me back, till the heart of me weeps to belong

To the old Sunday evenings at home, with winter outside

And hymns in the cosy parlour, the tinkling piano our guide.

So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamour 

With the great black piano appassionato. The glamour 

Of childish days is upon me, my manhood is cast

Down in the flood of remembrance, I weep like a child for the past.

***

Oh my gawsh.  Guess what we just bought?

An ebony Yamaha upright acoustic piano.

I'm beside myself with JOY.

At last.

After years of a hired keyboard, then graduating to a hired digital piano from the fabulous local Canberra institution, the Young Music Society, it is time to graduate to the Real Thing.

I love the sound of my children practicing the Fred Flinstone cartoon theme, Brahm's Lullaby, Cockles and Mussels and London Bridge.  I love the grand, imposing and cultured appearance of the piano as a piece of furniture.  Now I will hear its authentic sound reverberate through the house and up the street.

The laboured rhythms of scales repeated.  The daily dozen exercises and the moaning that sometimes goes with it.   

We have the spot marked out with blu tack and sticky labels.

It should be here within a week or so.