fast, fast, the fingers go on chords. down spines. lips and ears and skin turn into music. conversation. always easy and hard pressed. at just the right spots. whether on the backs of frozen envelopes waiting for buses in stranger's hands a million miles away or in a cab back from an expensive dinner bought and paid for by your father or my mother. there's no frequency. for this. nothing to make the resilience of memory cut like knives into the soft places behind knees. of when you punched your fists raw because of me. in spite of me. in the love of me. those fingers raw pressing out chords. no matter what the cost. the lonely sound of hands on strings. the dissonance of certain moments, the pressure, too hard. too long. empty palms sting. like unplayed pianos.