Poetry Corner: May/June 2017

Finger II

There was a pianist

who developed

a third index finger

not to play the piano with

though it sometimes did intervene

discreetly

in tricky passages

but to point things out

when both hands were busy

Once in a while

the finger shot from his nose

to expose an obstinate cougher in the hall

or emerged from beneath his tailcoat

beckoning a lady in the third row

In complicated fugues

you saw it rise to its full height

from under his shirt collar

indicating the theme in retrograde

Occasionally

when the harmony got muddled

it even turned against its owner

repeatedly knocking its knuckle

on his cranium

Whatever it wished to complain about

remained a mystery

for clearly the pianist was doing his best

and the audience

at such moments

held its breath

When subsequently

the finger disappeared

into the pianist's left upper pocket

one could sense

in the hall

a certain relief

The man with the videocamera

who had managed to record the scene

nodded off

and the critic

eager to retain the exact wording

wrote down the title of his piece

One finger too many

                                        — Alfred Brendel

From Playing the Human Game: Collected Poems of Alfred Brendel (Phaidon Press, 2011), courtesy of Alfred Brendel.