Poem 6 - Music Lesson

Photo:Sally Douglas

Music Lesson

The child is sitting on a chair

in a hall

in a sea of brown lino

She holds her brown bag

tight to her tight chest

as the clock ticks and ticks and never tocks

and the lodgers walk through the long hall

and up the stairs

and never come down.

She swings her legs tick tick

kick kick

so they stay awake

She swings her legs

one two one two

and one and two and three and four and

major scales crawl

under the door and

up the stairs

and down the stairs

and back under the door

and the small brass clock

under its small glass dome

which she cannot see

because it is

on top of the piano

on the other side of the door

counts on.

Sally Douglas

The poem about time (Poem 4 - Seven Glances at Time) reminded me of some notes I had made a while back about a childhood memory, so I dug them out. This is the poem.