If Only by Joseph Ross

 

December's Featured Poet is

Joseph Ross

If Only

 

For Elijah McClain, 1996-2019. Killed by police in Aurora, Colorado,

he was known as a gentle soul, who played his violin to soothe anxious

animals in shelters.

 

 

If only a violin could redeem

the world.

 

Your skin, glowing like the violin’s wood,

might still sing its humble lament.

 

Your fingers,

the supple dancers they were,

 

could skim across the violin’s

neck, could light each trembling

 

string. Your gentle

neck could guard the violin’s

 

shivering body, cradling its curves,

a lover.

 

If only we might be transformed,

to delight

 

in smallness, might cherish

a boy, a man, as whole as you.