The Doctors Say It’s Tinnitus

The static of old recording dulls the crests

of the notes, but it’s unmistakable: Chopin’s

B-flat Nocturne, the 1965 Rubinstein version,

plays on a loop in my ears. This is why

I sometimes can’t hear you, or hear pants

instead of stamps. Hushed beneath the melody,

but distinct, Rubinstein’s fingernails tap the keys—

a faraway woodpecker pecking a soft-wood tree,

like pine—and after so many listenings,

I notice the chirp of an unoiled damper sounding

at a frequency I’ve been long unable to hear.

It’s like that afternoon we broke into the music

school—this was the piece I played you,

the one I still knew by ear. The pedal squeaked

like rubber soles on linoleum. I played louder

to muffle it, my fingers somehow still dexterous,

my trills clean and bright. You never asked me

to be quieter, to be cautious. Now I strain to hear

anything over the music. Strange for my cochlea—

so like the strings of a piano, but immersed

in fluid—to be struck by this faint, familiar

chirping. A threatening squeak, your quiet urging.