Checkmate I should have picked it up ages ago They were just a little too solicitous, My friends, and when they looked at me They looked far off As through a fine mist Rising from a slightly colder breath Their voices too In parting were a Little bit too much They knew It was like a shave that seemed okay Until the mirror told you that the blade was dull – Or chess Which was initially a way for us To keep from talking but remain engaged It may have started over something Too big to broach Or perhaps too small to see The habit bred, in any case, And whether opening with Black or white We nearly always drew My lover had a way of capturing a piece By swinging the bottom of her ivory Against the head of mine to knock it down Except when she was closing in to mate Then she would deftly Lift, let’s say, my rook, into her palm While substituting a victorious knight In one one-handed swoop Gentle and neat It was a sign as sure as sunsets That my cause was lost Despite whatever tactical advantages I may have felt I had I was fascinated by her hands The narrow slender fingers with their tapered ends Agile and supple as a musician’s and Capable of stroking my cheek into a Frenzy of warmth or Reminding with a certain steel That hers could just as easily become A sheet of ice I wondered what she made of mine And whether I betrayed her to herself As she did me By fingerings Eventually it got so that the game Consumed the chief part of our time When the silences before her moves grew long I often measured them against the Rhythm of my pulse or breath Depending on the whim And sometimes to amuse myself I tried to keep track simultaneously And calculated formulae To link the independent beats: They never worked If I remember rightly I embraced the new After we decided on our separate ways So it was hard To fathom anything amiss Or dwell on devolution at the time But that’s just when, in retrospect, My friends began to finger me These days I keep imagining a piano Whose keys are still intact though Underneath the hood the Soundboard’s cracked beyond repair and There are few strings strung It may be touch and go But I’m convinced a tune Can still be wrung ________________________________________________________________________ Emanuel E. García, Sinking In, One Hundred Poems, 2013 |