Brahms coughs in G minor

lights a cigar from a newly-opened box

from Tchaikovsky

audaciously wrapped and mailed

years before.

"That giftless bastard!"

growls the old, fat man

into his hirsute napkin

the smoke seeping into sauerkraut and sex.

Nearly finished

he lowers at his two piles of music before him.

"Not good enough!"

he spits at the papers on the left

and

fifty years of scratchings burn for hours

starting with an autographed spill

of 'Swan Lake'.

He wishes he had Clara's letters

to burn again. A burgher grunt;

he had done as he had promised years before.

Placing a copy of 'The Blue Danube' on top of the remaining pile

he removes pictures of Clara and himself

from their shattered glass

on the grand piano

and burns them

and the nineteen cigars.

Brahms in Vienna

opens the window

clamps that chill to his chest

gobs in the box

hacks into the night.