Music History Poem by Max Reif

I played arpeggios for Mrs. Aranda,
who smelled so good
and came to our house every week.
She had a giant, blue vase
on the stone front porch
of her Spanish house
past which I'd walk sometimes,
a neighborhood away,
and a tall, dark son
with a different last name,
who wore black
leather jackets to our school.

I learned to play 'Star Dust' by heart,
the memory of which remains in my fingers
for some mysterious reason
long after 'The Poor People Of Paris',
Chopin's 'Nocturne', Tchaikovsky's
'Concerto in E Flat Minor',
and 'The Paradise Waltz' have all
dissolved into dust in my brain.

One week I hid
in the bookcase when she came,
and when caught,
refused to play my scales —
consistent with my record
of practice during the week.
We fought to a draw. I never did
play the scales, but when she left I missed
her perfume and her face.

Maybe that day was why
a little later in my memory
dad was driving us
every week to Miss Gilbert's,
in a drab duplex in the City,
where my brother and I took turns
at the upright, half an hour each,
while someone we never got to see
shuffled in the next room,
hidden behind a green curtain,
and dad waited in the car.

By the time I was twelve
my parents gave up,
and I never had to come home to practice again
and was free
to roam the baseball field
until the sun went down.