vaneramos | On playing the piano

I guess it’s too late to become a concert pianist
I guess it’s too late to be a prodigy
I guess it’s too late to practice every night from the age of six
I guess it’s too late to start practicing like that
I guess I couldn’t get used it for hours every day
I guess I’ll never be a famous pianist now
I guess I’ll never master all the sonatas of Beethoven
I guess I couldn’t win a music scholarship
I guess I can’t afford to go back to school
I guess I’m too old to attend the Royal Conservatory
I guess my body couldn’t handle the rigours
I guess I won’t win any Tchaikovsky Competition
I guess I’d be too tired to go on tour
I guess I can’t expect I’ll ever become a concert pianist
I guess Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto is too hard to learn anyway
I guess I won’t know how it feels to sit in the centre of an orchestra
I guess I’d be too intimidated to make eye contact with the conductor
I guess an audience wouldn’t applaud my solo
I guess it’s one career nobody ever starts late in life
You only ever hear of musicians retiring early like Ben Heppner
Refusing to give any more live performances like Glenn Gould
Or disappearing from the public eye like Ivo Pogorelić
And although musicians sometimes go into broadcasting
You never hear of them making their mark as writers
After all that public attention
They couldn’t get used to sitting alone in a quiet room
I guess that’s something I’d miss
It’s possible to work hard at more than one thing
But it’s hard to master anything without obsession
And becoming a concert pianist requires that kind of dedication
I miss the grand piano I played as a child
Maybe I’ll own one again someday
I couldn’t afford one now
And there isn’t room in the townhouse
My parents told me I could do whatever I wanted
But without ever saying it they told me money was everything
And people couldn’t make money as musicians
Or painting landscapes or writing novels
Unless they were famous
So with unintentional rebellion I become an obscure writer
It’s tough to prove a point in more ways than one
Unless I believe it utterly
I still haven’t proven to myself I can survive on the income
I can only believe my life depends on writing
It’s too late to believe living depends on anything else

Prompted by Essay, by Bernadette Mayer