Playing with Poetry – “The Piano”
Use the following text, copy it to a word document, and play with where the lines should end to create your own version of this poem. See if you can use line length / endings as dramatically as the author does.
I sit on the edge of the dining room, almost in the living room where my parents, my grandmother, & the visitors sit knee to knee along the chesterfield & in the easy chairs. The room is full & my feet do not touch the floor, barely reach the rail across the front of my seat. Of course you will want Bobby to play – words that jump out from the clatter of teacups & illnesses. The piano is huge, unforgettable. It takes up the whole end wall of the living room, faces me down a short corridor of plump knees, balanced saucers, hitched trousers. ‘Well when is Bob going to play?’ one of them asks. My dad says, ‘Come on, boy, they’d like you to play for them,’ & clears a plate of cake from the piano bench. I walk between the knees & sit down where the cake was, switch on the fluorescent light above the music. Right at the first notes the conversation returns to long tales of weddings, relatives bombed out again in England, someone’s mongoloid baby, & there I am at the piano with no one listening or even going to listen unless I hit sour notes, or stumble to a false ending. I finish. Instantly they are back to me. ‘What a nice touch he has,’ someone interrupts herself to say. ‘It’s the hands,’ says another, ‘It’s always the hands, you can tell by the hands,’ & so I get up & hide my fists in my hands.
Option: Open the following website, paste the poem text into it, and configure the settings to get the most appropriate visual representation of the poem’s theme or tone as you can.
Metaphor Poem
The moment all kids dread,
The room is filled with death.
When the light becomes a waxless candle,
Not left in complete darkness,
But with the beating heart of the numbers.
Left alone I am an abandoned pup,
Unwilling to let myself drift,
Not alone with the eyes from the bullies in my closet on me,
The silent whispers they send are nothing but feathers in my ear
I am helpless in these rags as a mummy child.
Bedtime.
Piano lessons-worse part of my childhood
Prisoner walking into my cell
The warden drills my fingers until their iron
Forcing me to play the same tune
Shackling me to my feelings of contempt
Why would my parents send me to death row?
What did I do to deserve this?
Constantly pleading my case
My prosecutors never sway for a second
Oh, how I hate piano lessons
School: A Prose Poem by Shelby and Kaity (highly exaggerated)
School:
We are forced to go
by our parents, everyday
we come, we sit, we stare at the hollow words
that will be forgotten once the freedom bell rings
5 minutes we have
fleeting and quick are these minutes
then we return to another room
where we daydream through prison bars
and the teachers, with their hawk eyes
always watching, always judging
starving our hungry minds
School: we were forced to go
I sit
on the edge of the dining room,
almost in the living room
where my parents, my grandmother, & the visitors sit
knee to knee along the chesterfield & in the easy chairs.
The room is full & my feet do not touch the floor,
barely reach the rail across the front of my seat.
Of course you will want Bobby to play
– words that jump out
from the clatter of teacups & illnesses.
The piano is huge, unforgettable.
It takes up the whole end wall of the living room,
faces me down a short corridor of plump knees,
balanced saucers,
hitched trousers.
‘Well when is Bob going to play?’ one of them asks.
My dad says, ‘Come on, boy, they’d like you to play for them,’
& clears a plate of cake from the piano bench.
I walk between the knees & sit
down where the cake was,
switch on the fluorescent light above the music.
Right at the first notes the conversation returns
to long tales of weddings, relatives bombed out again in England, someone’s mongoloid baby, & there
I am at the piano with no one listening
or even going to listen unless
I hit sour notes, or stumble to a false ending.
I finish.
Instantly they are back to me.
‘What a nice touch he has,’ someone interrupts herself to say.
‘It’s the hands,’ says another,
‘It’s always the hands, you can tell by the hands,’
& so I get up & hide
my fists in my hands.
I sit on the edge of the dining room,
almost in the living room
where my parents, my grandmother, & the visitors sit,
knee to knee along the chesterfield & in the easy chairs.
The room is full & my feet do not touch the floor,
barely reach the rail across the front of my seat.
Of course you will want Bobby to play –
words that jump out from the clatter of teacups & illnesses.
The piano is huge, unforgettable.
It takes up the whole end wall of the living room,
faces me down a short corridor of plump knees, balanced saucers, hitched trousers.
‘Well when is Bob going to play?’ one of them asks.
My dad says, ‘Come on, boy, they’d like you to play for them,’ & clears a plate of cake from the piano bench.
I walk between the knees & sit down where the cake was,
switch on the fluorescent light above the music.
Right at the first notes the conversation returns to long tales of weddings, relatives bombed out again in England, someone’s mongoloid baby,
& there I am at the piano with no one listening or even going to listen unless I hit sour notes, or stumble to a false ending.
I finish.
Instantly they are back to me.
‘What a nice touch he has,’ someone interrupts herself to say. ‘It’s the hands,’ says another,
‘It’s always the hands, you can tell by the hands,’ & so I get up & hide my fists in my hands.
Kennedi
I sit on the edge of the dining room,
almost in the living room where my parents, my grandmother, & the visitors sit knee to knee along the chesterfield & in the easy chairs.
The room is full & my feet do not touch the floor,
barely reach the rail across the front of my seat
Of course you will want Bobby to play –
words that jump out from the clatter of teacups & illnesses.
The piano is huge, unforgettable.
It takes up the whole end wall of the living room,
faces me down a short corridor of plump knees, balanced saucers, hitched trousers.
‘Well when is Bob going to play?’ one of them asks.
My dad says, ‘Come on, boy, they’d like you to play for them,’ & clears a plate of cake from the piano bench.
I walk between the knees & sit down where the cake was,
switch on the fluorescent light above the music.
Right at the first notes
the conversation returns to long tales of weddings, relatives bombed out again in England, someone’s mongoloid baby,
& there I am at the piano
with no one listening or even going to listen
unless I hit sour notes, or stumble to a false ending.
I finish.
Instantly they are back to me.
‘What a nice touch he has,’ someone interrupts herself to say.
‘It’s the hands,’ says another,
‘It’s always the hands, you can tell by the hands,’ & so I get up
& hide my fists in my hands.
K.
sit on the edge of the dining room,
Almost in the living room where my parents,
my grandmother, & the visitors sit knee to knee along the chesterfield & in the easy chairs.
The room is full & my feet do not touch the floor, barely reach the rail across the front of my seat.
Of course you will want Bobby to play
– words that jump out from the clatter of teacups & illnesses.
The piano is huge, unforgettable.
It takes up the whole end wall of the living room, faces me down a short corridor of plump knees, balanced saucers, hitched trousers.
‘Well when is Bob going to play?’
one of them asks.
My dad says, ‘Come on, boy, they’d like you to play for them,’ & clears a plate of cake from the piano bench.
I walk between the knees & sit down where the cake was, switch on the fluorescent light above the music.
Right at the first notes the conversation returns to long tales of weddings, relatives bombed out again in England,
someone’s mongoloid baby,
& there I am at the piano with no one listening or even going to listen
unless I hit sour notes, or stumble to a false ending.
I finish. Instantly they are back to m.
‘What a nice touch he has,’ someone interrupts herself to say.
‘It’s the hands,’ says another,
‘It’s always the hands, you can tell by the hands,’
& so I get up & hide my fists in my hands.
I sit on the edge of the dining room, almost in the living room
where my parents, my grandmother, & the visitors sit knee to knee
along the chesterfield & in the easy chairs the room is full
& my feet do not touch the floor, barely reach the rail across the front of my seat.
Of course you will want Bobby to play –
words that jump out from the clatter of teacups & illnesses.
The piano is huge, unforgettable.
It takes up the whole end wall of the living room,
faces me down a short corridor of plump knees, balanced saucers, hitched trousers.
‘Well when is Bob going to play?’ one of them asks.
My dad says, ‘Come on, boy, they’d like you to play for them,’ & clears a plate of cake from the piano bench.
I walk between the knees & sit down where the cake was,
switch on the fluorescent light above the music right at the first notes
the conversation returns to long tales of weddings, relatives bombed out again
in England, someone’s mongoloid baby, & there I am at the piano with no one listening
or even going to listen unless I hit sour notes,
or stumble to a false ending.
I finish.
Instantly they are back to me. ‘What a nice touch he has,’ someone interrupts herself to say.
‘It’s the hands,’ says another, ‘It’s always the hands, you can tell by the hands,’
& so I get up & hide my fists in my hands.