Piano

My sister was seven days in the cold ground when the piano began playing itself.

My sister was seven days in the cold ground
when the piano began playing itself,

a lonely ringing voice in the winter night,
snow-consumed howl of mourning

breaking the silence we clung to
like a life raft. My mother grew furious

and beat the thing as if it were a disobedient child.
When it did not cease, my father took a set of pliers

to the keys, pulled them like teeth
until there was nothing left

but a gaping grin and the tremendous weight
of an absence. Later, we awoke in darkness

as the wolves screamed hell into the freezing wind
just outside our windows.