Musical Creatures

Musical creatures
Littered the space
From the seats of the chairs
To the formica top
Of the counter which ran
Past the battered old desk
Where he poured out his life
In the making of things.

Grotesque and exotic,
Contorted and strange,
They appeared at a glance
Just like something he'd seen
In the page of a book
On the mammalian kinds;
But upon closer sight
They did not live at all
And became like a horn
Or a bass, or trombone.
With its wings raised on high
Proudly Flying Horse stood,
A piano quite Grand
With the strings in its back
And its coat painted black.
Or a cello became
In its jocular way
A convertible beaver
With a flat, striped tail.

He dreamed of his beasts
In the depths of the night,
And he cried for the duck
Which had lost both its feet
When his right hand had slipped
After he had remembered
That none of these creatures
Could ever be played.

1984