Brief Landing on the Earth's Surface

Mrs. Richard Plays a Starlight Waltz

Mrs. Richards Plays a Starlight Waltz There's a Buick dealership where her house squaned in a clutter ofceramic statues: a jockey hoisting a lantern, elves and mushrooms clustered around a birdbath full ofrotting leaves, a salmon-pink Aamingo. Seven, I carry an empty lunchbox past a spruce still draped with Christmas bulbs, onco the porch where the purple clematis dangles itS weird, white-rimmed blooms. Inside is sudden darkness. Pale and fat,she sits by the piano, bare arms like buoys, her girdle and wig removed for comfon. red hair gone to fuzz. I play my piece, "A Starlight WaIn," pounding her baby grand the way at home I pound our toneless spinet. Now the cuckoo pops out to perform his mysterious office, bows three times and chordes, bobs back in. She grumbles. shifts. Then softly, as one would touch a stranger or a lover, her fingers brush the keys. O n a veranda lit by moon and Stars, this century or another, a man bends toward a woman, the notes around mem drifting, moving on. 39 I think ofscience class. theday the teacher brought ajar of lilac·scented cream. She carefUlly opened it (0 show us that a fragrance, though unseen, is particles ofsomething real. Released, it travels through the air like pollen, through the screensand into traffic. farther, beyond our houses, yards, theswing sets, junglegyms. the things we know; beyond the edge oftown, the tall and temporary trees. ...