The Violin Keeper

When you left here
I had stashed the violin under the bed
and told you I hadn't seen it in weeks.
You'd pluck its strings
over our Sunday dinners
and you'd ask me to sing
and dear God,
I think that's the only time we knew
true partnership, collaboration
a little me plus a little you
both uncompromising harmonious beauties.
That violin was the only
damn thing I loved about us.

You stormed out of my house
slamming cupboards, stomping shoes
the frantic mad genius who just lost
the only link left to a sanity
he had remembered to have had once.
I didn't care what happened to you next
because you were a little recipe for disaster
and I was quite full, thank you.
I cradled the violin under my chin
and I pulled the bow so ungracefully
my fingers are clumsy
my notes so sour
a mad genius left half of him under my bed.
I was always the heart hoarder.
Half haunted by constant wrong turns, wrong tones
out of this stupid wooden box
that was nothing short of beautiful
in your hands.