In Playing the Black Piano, poet Bill Holm confronts themes of aging, AIDS, friendship, and music, revealing an everyman sensibility that celebrates the beauty, truth, and evanescence of everyday life. Typical is Playing Haydn for the Angel of Death, in which the reaper sits in a straight-backed chair in the side yard, in no hurry to claim his due as long as strains of Haydn drift through the window to amuse and distract him.