The Harp

When he was my age and I was already a boy my father made a machine in the garage. A wired piece of steel with many small and beautiful welds ground so smooth they resembled rows of pearls. He went broke with whatever it was. He held it so carefully in his arms. He carried it foundry to foundry. I think it was his harp, I think it was what he longed to make with his hands for the world. He moved it finally from the locked closet to the bedroom to the garage again where he hung it on the wall until I climbed and pulled it down and rubbed it clean and tried to make it work.