Out of Tune


I felt sorry for Bobby
when his mother
called him off the streets
to practice piano lessons
while we played football,

embarassed when
my teacher asked
me to mouth the words to

“Polly Wolly Doodle?
because the class
followed earlessly as I
wandered off key,

incredulous when
the high school
choir teacher called me in,
asked me to join
the choir after hearing
me perform in a skit.

Finally felt I’d
found my true music
upon reading,
“If a man does not keep
pace with his companions,
perhaps it is because
he hears a different drummer,?

nearly had a flashback,
and broke out laughing
hearing my grandson,
humming the soundtrack
of “Pirates of the Caribean?
while listening through headphones.

Tonight Skye lays
his head sorrowfully
on my lap whenever
I begin humming along with
Baka Beyond’s “Ngombi?
while reading the news,
knows I’m still hopelessly
out of tune.

3 thoughts on “Out of Tune”

  1. This must be an original poem which I like very much. You do good work.

    I have discovered writing in the early morning is very comforting.

  3. Thanks to both of you.

    It’s something I’ve been working on on the side while trying to write a much more difficult poem that just doesn’t seem to want to happen at the moment.

    I was inspired by a phrase in a Billy Collins’ poem.

    While I’m an evening person, not a morning person, I I find sitting alone in my den at night writing strangely comforting too, Diane.

    I think I wrote my best poems right after I discovered that I had prostate cancer last year and before I decided what I would do about it. There’s something about uncertainty to spark ideas.

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