And You Could Play Me 

12/3/95

1.  I wish I was your guitar, and you could play me.

            Your voice like liquid silver, your song

                                     a River of Gold;

            And as your guitar gently sings free

            I wish I were inside your music

                        And you could sing me.

2.       My piano seems clumsy now,

            My song a rusty rumble.

            Your voice, a stream of living meaning,

            Floating the cork of me as I tumble,

            Down the waterfalls of acoustic travel—

            As your electric leads unravel,

            I wish I was your guitar (darling)—

                        And you could play me.

3.       Now here’s the counter to the point:

            As your picking intertwines with my mind,

            Thinking on extensions of 7ths, 9ths and                                           suspensions.

            If I were your fingers and your guitar strings were                               my keys,

            I’d be sailing home by now

                   on windswept ivory seas.

                        But at last I wander home alone,

                        Washed up on this deserted beach.

            My piano doesn’t sing to me anymore,

                        I’m shipwrecked and out of reach—

            Removed from the melody of your inspiration.

Left unable to feel the pulse of your rhythmic strums.

            I wish I was your guitar, (as she so gently runs)

            And you could play me.  So she could play me…

c. 2000, Michael A. Guy, all rights reserved. (Original version c. 1995) dedication: for M.C.C. but I don’t remember which of her CDs I wss listening to when I wrote this lyric