“Anniversary” by Philip Appleman
Maybe it wasn’t strange to find
drums and cymbals where
there might have been violins, maybe
we couldn’t have known; besides,
would it have mattered?
Look at this hand, this arm:
the thick scar across the knuckles,
another in the palm, a ragged one
running along the forearm.
And you:
I know your scars at midnight
by touch.
Everything we’ve learned, we’ve picked up
by ear, a pidgin language
of the heart, just
enough to get by on:
we know the value of cacophony; how to measure
with a broken yardstick;
what to do with bruised fruit;
reading torn maps, we always
make it home, riding
on empty.
And whatever this thing is—palace?
cottage?—we remember
putting it up, every beam,
sighting it skew, making it plumb
eventually; and here it stands,
stone over rock, and on the simple hearth
is our own cricket; and in the walls
there are secret passages
leading to music
nobody else can hear; and somewhere
in a room that’s not yet finished
there are volumes in our own hand, telling
troubled tales, promises kept, and
promises
still to keep.