Each of us knows some
things
Most others don't know;
You may know how it felt when
You won that contest,
Just as I know that feeling of seeing
The Beatles;
Or when it's late
The children at last in bed,
Aching muscles tingling as you relax,
And your day settles over you
Like Heaven's blanket,
Just as I have waited at the piano
After a gig
To find the note that matches
The ringing in my ears;
Or the time you ran that stop sign,
Or suddenly thought you had,
And resisted the urge to turn around,
To go back
And see if a sign was there at all,
Just as I found my way
Out of that room
By climbing over the furniture
Because my acid-soaked mind
Had dissolved the floor,
Only to be greeted at the door
By the person I was
Before I entered.
So how do I tell you about
My grandfather,
About how he taught me to play chess,
What he called, "T-H-E Game"?
I don't know what you know.
Is it like that stop sign?
Is he the touch of your son's fragile hand?
The realization that there is a positive force
That transcends your life
And allows you to win a contest?
At the FIDE sanctioned tournaments,
Between games,
Can you hear him tell me:
In your child's voice,
The child I never had
But through my grandfather?
There is a moment in every game—
visceral
On both sides of the board—
When the opponent suddenly
knows
What all of the universe knows;
And life itself;
What you keep from your child
For as long as you can,
Until one day he asks you some
thing
For which you have no answer
And there is nothing left
but to resign.