My mother once bought me a piano,
A stately mahogany-coloured thing,
Which we still have, although now more for show;
I recall not when last I heard it sing.
Instead, it bore portraits and porcelain
And hid the paintings never hung behind;
This degrading fate must have caused chagrin,
Indeed I thought it wretched and unkind.
And the simple eloquence of Satie,
The fine romance of Chopin’s whirlwind mind,
The glory of Saint-Saëns and Mussorgsky,
Ludwig, Mozart: sublimity refined,
Were never heard from that great sulking chest
That she bought: classes were never addressed.
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