-the accordion lesson-

––they were held on Saturday mornings in a vacant,

oversized room in an old, redbrick building on Second Street.

on this Saturday, I’m there with cousin Paul, an accordion student

three years my elder, whose hair was an Italian wave of glistening

black in its sea of Wildroot Cream Oil. 

cousin Paul was in the early developmental stage of knuckleball techniques,

and I was beginning to notice something was going on with the girls;

something intriguing. 

metal folding chairs were meticulously placed in a circle such so

that even Leonardo might’ve assigned his name to it.

––seven mothers walked in with their kids in tow, each kid

struggling to carry his accordion at rest in its bulking case.

––the instructor, tall and lanky in his mid-twenties began the session

by impressing everyone with his rapid rendition of “Lady of Spain"

a tune I was familiar with and remembered singing as:
“Lady of Spain I adore you. Pull down your pants I’ll explore you..” 

––but ending his proof of qualification, the lanky specialist

pulled his accordion's intriguing bellows outward from the straps

making a sound only an accordion would dare to make.
the kids in the circle followed along in this learning procedure;

bellows out (shriek)  bellows in (shriek)  and so on.

––I sat quietly against the wall with the smilingly proud mothers, then
closing the session at one hour to the second, the exhaled accordions
were packed-up inside their cases like exhausted iron lungs

and everyone walked out without making another sound.

Quequechan