Chord
By Stuart Dybek
A man steps out of sunlight,
sunlight that streams like grace,
still gaping at blue sky
staked across the emptiness of space,
into a history where shadows
assume a human face.
A man slips into silence
that began as a cry,
still trailing music
although reduced to the sigh
of an accordion
as it folds into its case.
Copyright Credit: "Chord" from Streets in Their Own Ink. Copyright © 2004 byStuart Dybek. Used with the permission of Farrar Straus & Giroux, LLC.
Source: Poetry (March 2001)