CJ Southworth: January 2021 Poet of the Month
Photo: Joanna C. Valente
The Cellist
He didn’t tell me he hated his birth name
until after I had introduced him
to almost everyone I knew.
My mother calls me Christian, he grimaced
at what I thought was adult propriety.
My name is Chris.
He picked his words out as carefully
as he plucked the notes in pizzicato
from his tall cello,
afraid the last fragments of his German enunciation
would somehow slip into his voice,
that someone would recognize he wasn’t as American
as his baseball caps
and GAP cargo shorts.
I was never allowed to hear his mother’s voice.
He smiled crookedly
when I told him he looked like the quiet one
from the Pet Shop Boys—
the one I thought was hot—
and thanked me in that dismissive way
that people use when they don’t agree with you
but have been taught that a rebuked compliment
is impolite.
He only played his cello when he needed to practice
or when he was on stage with the orchestra,
even though I begged him to strike those notes for me,
the long, slow ones
with the bow drawn evenly, sweetly
that would always make me burst into tears.
It wasn’t just that I wanted him to know
that he could make me feel something—
it’s that I wanted to think those notes
were an extension of what he felt too,
the sweet, sad sigh at the heart of me
finally meeting its kindred.
But there was always more to life than me,
and I tried to find my own way too,
but every man who broke my heart
sent me back to him again—
his long arms,
his body radiant heat beneath the covers,
always willing to wipe my eyes
even when he caused the tears.
When I knew I would never be enough for him—
that he would always want someone new,
someone more,
that he could not stop at plus one
or equals two—
I gave up
and let him have whoever he wanted.
He messages me sometimes,
says it’s hard to be almost fifty,
that no one wants him anymore,
and I won’t say the words that press to come out,
even though I still want him,
because I was never comfortable
being one of three or four,
not knowing who the others were.
I close my eyes sometimes,
picture him lonely in his living room,
cello held tightly between his knees,
the bow drawing out the low, long notes,
my eyes feeling moist.
CJ Southworth has won both the Allen Ginsberg Award and the SUNY Chancellors Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities. His poems have appeared in Assaracus, Main Street Rag, The Paterson Literary Review and many other journals. He has also published fiction in Glitterwolf, Jonathan, and Belle Ombre. He is currently an Assistant Professor of English at SUNY Jefferson in upstate New York.
